Sunday Photo Fiction is a weekly challenge presented by my old friend Al Forbes.
The idea is to write a short story (200 word max) inspired by what you see in his picture (below).
Today Al’s quite sad photo took me down a predictable route.
The one where I have no idea where I am going.
So did I get there?
Click on this link to enter your tale, and see what others have written.
Copyright Al Forbes
Click on the arrow to hear me read my story:
The Past
I have been to the future.
It is less interesting than you might think.
Okay, I haven’t yet been far into the future, I have just been testing my machine.
Yep, I have built a time machine.
And it works!
So I plan a new test today.
Or is it yesterday?
Ha, just a little Time Travel joke there.
I am going to the past.
I set the coordinates for two days ago, in the middle of the night.
I don’t want to arrive in the middle of dinner and upset my wife and children, do I!
I slip quietly out of the apartment, knowing that I am asleep in the next room.
That is a strange feeling, but I resist the temptation to look.
I walk to a nearby all night café which I have never before been in.
I order a coffee, read old news.
I look at the only other customer, he looks nervously back at me.
I am sure I don’t know him, but our eye contact suggests something is amiss.
I pretend to study a newspaper, he lifts his suitcase and leaves abruptly.
Minutes later I hear the explosion.
I run round the corner, and my worst fears are realised.
My home, my family, myself, all demolished.
Sound Bite Fiction 
With it goes the time machine also. Interesting story.
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Loved the reading of your prompt! What a unique idea. I was not at all ready for the twist!
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Oh, the machine! Well, its time to build another to set things straight! May be!
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This is a very interesting time travel take. I agree with Rochelle, it’s a bit mind boggling. It seems people and this gentlemen, didn’t remember that what he does in the present, affects his his future, especially when he’s going back to the past. Very sad his family got blown up. Will he travel again? I would think he would try to fix it and just make things worse. Nice one CE.
Hugs
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Oh Amanda, where have you been.
The rest of us are already on FF, and you are still blowing my mind here!
By the end of your third sentence my head was ready to implode, you are just too wonderful!
PS difficult to travel again, the machine is in the building.
But make things worse?
How!!!!
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Oh no in the building hmmm? Build another. Glad I ‘blew your mind’ and will get FF shortly. October Poetry Writing Month, much too many prompts 🙂 Hugs
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Reblogged this on Kate McClelland.
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Thank you, Kate, very kind.
I hope you did it because you enjoyed the story?
I visited and commented.
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I did enjoy the story. I wasn’t expecting that ending!
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Oops. He’s going to vaporize soon methinks. Meddling with time causes something to try and correct it. I don’t think he will be doing that again.
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Kinda tricky without his machine, Al, it is demolished with the building.
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Yep. He can’t even go back and tell himself not to go back.
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Aha the paradoxes of Time Travel! Anything is possible. The more complicated the better. Lovely enjoyable tale CE.
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Oh thank you!
I don’t pretend to understand it, but it is fun to write about!
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Admittedly, I am with Rochelle with the confusion in times. Or do you mean that he had actually invented it the day before, gone forwards, and then returned to the day he missed? Very clever if so! Good writing as always.
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As I said to Lady R, this is the time travel paradox.
I admit I did not understand your scenario, so I am pretty sure it wasn’t what I meant!
Thank you for trying to make sense of what none of us can.
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LOL! This is why none of us write Dr Who!
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Yes, the picture is a barrel of laughs indeed. I immediately thought of the Blitz, then of the many other blitzes going on right now that don’t make the Western media. In the old days, war sold papers. In modern times, it’s old hat. Yet the suffering is every bit as real, as is the aftermath. You’ve captured the horror quite well in your piece.
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Thank you, sir.
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Dear CE,
This one’s hard to wrap my head around. If he’s blown up two days ago how could he be alive with a time machine two days later? Or is this one of those things about not messing with time? Time travel stories boggle my mind, but I love them as I do yours.
Shalom,
Rochelle
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Indeed, m’lady, it is the great paradox of time travel.
If he had not gone back, he would be alive in the future to go back…
It boggles my mind too!
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