Bounce

“Is that the Grey Moon pub?” asked Sprite, shielding his eyes from a sun hanging low in the sky.

“Looks like it,” replied Lucy. “And that looks like Yuffie’s horse outside.”

“You don’t sound happy about that,” said Sprite.

“She’s been a bit aggy with me recently,” grumbled Lucy. “I replaced her bed with a trampoline before I left for the isles.”

“Oh, aye?” said Sprite. “How did that go?”

“She hit the roof,” chuckled Lucy.

Cheers to Bruce, Badger, Kathy & Warren for the continued $10 Patronage. You can find me on Ko Fi, Patreon, Etsy, Amazon, Skillshare and Threadless.

Road

“Could you go ahead?” asked Sprite. “See if you can catch him?”

“The wind’s dropped,” sighed Lucy. “I can’t move any faster than you. I’ll go with you though.”

“Cheers,” sighed Sprite. “I know life ends for all of us someday, but…”

“Yeah, I know,” replied Lucy. “Yuffie and I lost a dear friend a few months back. She covered herself in lard a few days before she died.”

“Why?” asked Sprite.

“Not sure,” sighed Lucy. “But she went downhill fast.”

Cheers to Bruce, Badger, Kathy & Warren for the continued $10 Patronage. You can find me on Ko Fi, Patreon, Etsy, Amazon, Skillshare and Threadless.

Invisible

A gust of wind blew up the road, and lucy floated down beside Sprite. “Missing your bro?” she asked.

“Yeah,” sighed Sprite. “I think he’s taking the road to the afterlife. I’m trying to catch up to him, but I think he has a good headstart on me.”

“Well, I’ve just dropped out of the sky, and you’re the only figure I could see for miles,” she remarked. “Although I’m sure I saw the footprints and the invisible woman, man, and their children.”

“Hang on,” said Sprite, “They had kids? What are they like?”

“Well,” chuckled Lucy. “They’re nothing to look at.”

Cheers to Bruce, Badger, Kathy & Warren for the continued $10 Patronage. You can find me on Ko Fi, Patreon, Etsy, Amazon, Skillshare and Threadless.

Playlist

Sprite looked up the road and knew where Spectre had gone and that he may have a significant headstart. He put his headphones on, cracked open Spotify and started Sinéad O’Connor greatest hits. For a moment, he pondered how long it had been since he last heard this playlist.

It’s been 7 hours and 15 days…

Cheers to Bruce, Badger, Kathy & Warren for the continued $10 Patronage. You can find me on Ko Fi, Patreon, Etsy, Amazon, Skillshare and Threadless.

Empty

Sprite awoke in unfamiliar surroundings. He was sitting on a road, and in every direction, all he could see was sand. The trees, the wall and Spectre, who were all here when he went to sleep, were missing.

“Cripes alive,” said Sprite. “This place is emptier than a Tory promise.”

Today’s the last day my Skillshare course, Start publishing on Medium.com, is free. From tomorrow, it’ll be available only to premium members. If you enroll today though, it’s free for life. Linky: https://skl.sh/2N9RejV

Cheers to Bruce, Badger, Kathy & Warren for the continued $10 Patronage. You can find me on Ko Fi, Patreon, Etsy, Amazon, Skillshare and Threadless.

Black Sands

(The story thus far. This series runs until October, so check back, Monday to Friday for the rest of the tales. In October, we’ll have a new series to coincide with Inktober.)

The Fears face unfamiliar horrors with a familiar sense of humour, as we find them washing ashore on a stretch of islands in the lands in-between.

Black Sands is our current series, with new tales published five days a week. Monday to Friday. Check back daily for updates.

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To be continued…

Check back every day, Monday to Friday in July, for further tales from the black sands.

Without Patreon, cups of ko-fi, Threadless sales and all the other links below, I wouldn’t be able to make you all groan every day and create series like this. So thank you, everyone, for all the support. May the groans and grimaces I cause give your face laughter lines and your scalp grey hairs. Thank you.

As always, shout out and thanks to Bruce, Badger, Kathy & Warren for the continued $10 Patronage. You can find me on Ko Fi, Patreon, Etsy, Amazon, Skillshare and Threadless.

Clue

“Listen,” said Lucy. “You keep asking me why I’m here, have you ever wondered why you’re here? Do you even remember how you got here?”

“I…” stammered Meria, “I don’t know how I got here. I don’t know why I’m here.”

“Good grief,” chuckled Lucy. “It’s like watching Boris Johnson standing up in parliament.”

Cheers to Bruce, Badger, Kathy & Warren for the continued $10 Patronage. You can find me on Ko Fi, Patreon, Etsy, Amazon, Skillshare and Threadless.

Sharked

“The sharks won’t let me off this island,” growled Meria. “Every time I try to leave they swarm around me. Tear me apart. Then I wake up in my bed, unharmed.”

“I’d say there’s something fishy about your story,” pondered Lucy. “But that’d be jumping the shark.”

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Wind

“You’re able to leave this island?” gasped Meria. “How?”

“The next storm,” remarked Lucy. “I’ll simply turn to smoke and drift away on the wind.”

“During the last storm,” pondered Meria, “I’d been smoking local plants, and I was sure I saw a cow in the sky. Tumbling around in the wind.”

“Well, that’s a high steaks vision,” chuckled Lucy.

Arr, first week of September and I have a cold! That’s it! I’m not leaving the house for six months. Come back Scottish summer, all is forgiven!

OK, there’s no way I could, in good conscience, post this story without also posting the old pun-filled story, Cows with guns, by Dana Lyons.

Join the fight for bovine freedom, people!

Cheers to Bruce, Badger, Kathy & Warren for the continued $10 Patronage. You can find me on Ko Fi, Patreon, Etsy, Amazon, Skillshare and Threadless.

Zero

“So is that for Sprites?” asked Parrotfish. “Their authors dead and social media has declared their childhood dead.”

“Many will remember Sprites fondly and the books still in circulation,” replied Cuttle. “They’ll be remembered and live on for generations.”

“Unlike the guy who wrote a book about zero before mathematics was invented,” remarked Jelly.

“I met him on the road to the afterlife,” remarked Cuttle. “I thanked him for nothing.”

Cheers to Bruce, Badger, Kathy & Warren for the continued $10 Patronage. You can find me on Ko Fi, Patreon, Etsy, Amazon, Skillshare and Threadless.