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The gods asked us to build them a palace and to annually perform sacrifices such that the rivulets carved into the floor would run red and full, but what we found out is that the gods are so removed from our experience that they have no idea what blood actually is.
That’s why our temple floors are flooded with Mountain Dew Code Red(TM) and our crops have never been healthier!
FOOL THE VERY GODS IN THEIR HEAVENS WITH MOUNTAIN DEW!
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lost time incident 83
It’s Easter Sunday here in these United States and the sun is shining, which means it must be time to sit behind blackout curtains and think about scary stuff that might populate a mansion. I hope it’s time to do that, because that’s what I’ve been doing.
Hi, folks.
Since the last time I sent out an edition of this newsletter, I released WITCHES TOWN, an ebook the collects the best of over a year’s worth of microfiction offerings, both funny and creepy, including bits that appeared here for you, loyal subscribers.
So if you’ve been thinking: I really like the LOST TIME INCIDENT newsletter but it would be a lot better if the fiction bits were collected all in one place… well, you’re in luck.
You can pay what you like for WITCHES TOWN over at Gumroad. (“What you like” can also be “download it for free”. I’m just happy it’s being read. The tip jar is optional, but it does help reimburse me for the amazing art that’s included in the book.)
I’ll also offer this: As a subscriber to this newsletter, if you pay $5 or more for the book, drop me an email and I’ll send you a “signed” copy. (Basically, I’ll edit one or all of the book formats with an inscription personalized to you.) For $10 or more, I’ll write an original piece that specifically includes you and insert that into your personal copy, plus the inscription.
For $6.66 I’ll give you a version of the book that will send you straight to the Devil. Please don’t do this. I shouldn’t have this sort of power but every day, the voices… the voices, they beg me to destroy someone’s soul. I don’t want to do it.
Ha ha! Just a funny joke!
Those voices mostly tell me about times I embarrassed myself in the past and about how the future is bearing down on us at all times.
Okay! Who wants to see some microfiction?
genre fiction
As the torch drips in the dark passageway, the archaeologist of the group pores over the ancient glyphs.
“As I thought. This squiggly bit here looks like a doggy.”
As the wizard watched his entire occult library go up in flames– a hazard for those who stick candles in skulls and expect them to never fall over– he could be heard muttering to himself “Oh, I do hope it turns out the magic was inside me all along.”
The space rogue sneered over the space poker table. “Ha! The only thing in this world that I trust is my laser pistol.”
“You need to work on those trust issues,” piped up the laser pistol from under the table.
“I know,” said the space rogue.
“You can’t just rely on me. It’s not healthy and you end up moody and withdrawn.”
And just like that, the pre-gunfight lacuna got awkward.
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back in my day we didn’t have social media
you wanted a stranger to give you some positive feedback you had to walk along the train tracks gathering sodee bottles and distribute ’em to the rail-bums who knew how to get cash for ’em and they’d give you half a dirty playing card you’d hide in a tree house and while you was up there thinking about life, some soldier back from the war would see you out their window from the room they scream in and they’d give you a thumbs up
just like that
ending theme song
Two weekends back, my wife Amanda and I went to a small indie role-playing game convention in Albuquerque, New Mexico. It was called, appropriately enough, New Mexicon. We figured: Where better to face our social anxiety about meeting strangers than by flying to another state and then attempting to learn unfamiliar game systems & participate in creative endeavours with them? If it doesn’t work out, we can just never go back to New Mexico.
As it turns out, the people at New Mexicon were friendly and lots of fun to play with. I received such immediate and enthusiastic support from fellow attendees that I actually volunteered to facilitate a game session in the very first available session, day 1. I lead a group of strangers in creating a living language for an isolate community of homesteaders on Mars. How about that?
Anyway, that recent experience is part of why my Sunday morning was spent thinking about mansions and monsters. I’ll be running a small game/experiment RPG-shaped thing online, using voice-over-internet. I’ll be trying my hand at running a horror-themed game with some friends & relations, and I’m writing up an original scenario rather than using something pre-written.
I turned 43 this month.
So far, so good.
Still here. Thanks for being here with me.
—Michael Van Vleet
Hey! Did you enjoy reading this? But did you find yourself thinking “Dang, if only this sort of thing were delivered directly into my inbox so I didn’t have to spend time on a website as if it were still the 90s or something!”?
You’re in luck! You can subscribe to the LOST TIME INCIDENT newsletter and finally class up your inbox.
1) The Feathered
2) The Bone Clock Contingent
3) Scarf Boys
4) Clothes As Doors
5) Elliot, With A Hat
6) The Off Racks
7) Jumblety Pegs
8) The Don’t Looks
9) A Shoe
10) Me (And Maybe You, and A Hand Mirror?)
At New Mexicon, a role-playing game convention, I had the pleasure of playing The Unofficial Highlander 2 Role-Playing Game and I took some time to write down as much as I could from my notes about how the game went. If you’d like to read about a writer’s room writing a sequel to Highlander 2 on the fly, well… you’re in luck.
1) Poison Girls
2) The Eighteen and One
3) Manny’s Chicken Hut Buck-AWK
4) We Are Not A Gang We Are Nothing At All
5) Reds
6) Bone Rollers
7) Elliot, With A Bat
8) A Dropped Quarter
9) The Aerated Fronds
10) Us, You and Me, If You Say Yes And Join My Gang, I’m On My Knees, Just Us
Horror drippy blood font:
THE COCONUT
green wash background of beach sand and in foreground is a coconut, but the coconut has been carved so it looks like a SKULL
pull quote along bottom: “I’ve never been more scared of a nut… or more nuts about a scare!” [find writer from same publisher to attribute quote to]
Plot: Coconuts figure out how to kill. Let the contract writer figure out the rest. FALL 2019 release.
paperback release MSRP $5.99
Sure, we may have strung a few twig dolls throughout the forest, but that doesn’t mean the forest is HAUNTED. Or EVIL.
It’s the ghosts. The forest is haunted ’cause of ghosts. Not twig dolls.
Duh.
Oh, and real quick, you’ll never make it out of these woods alive, you’ll be trapped in our dollies forever, okay GOODBYE.
Top three curses you’re gonna want to have in your shop window, or you’re not going to make it in this town:
) Nose Puddle
) They Were Looking At You The Whole Time
) It’s Always Someone’s Birthday
You get those down, you’re all set. Bills will be paid. Lucky horseshoes will crack as you pass by.
You go your own way? Try to write a new bullpucky curse like Daffodil’s Lament? Or Tears of Mt. Fallen?
This town will swallow you whole AND you’ll lose that lease.
CONTENTS:
1) Out of fuel
2) Too much fuel
3) Think you saw aliens
4) Definitely saw aliens
5) Suspect you might be the real aliens
6) Cryochamber malfunction
7) Hypochamber malfunction
8) Scent Therapy Chamber malfunction
9) Doppelganger protocols
a) Only one doppelganger
b) So many doppelgangers
10) So you think you’ve got “space madness”…
11) Why the self-destruct button isn’t attached to anything
12) Suggested soundtracks
The Bishop of Antlers: Most often seen as a horned silhouette on rooftops, this bandit works with the local orphan community to organize thievery (when the orphans aren’t too busy kicking rat corpses for sport). The antlers are from a stuffed stag head that can be worn on the head or back and are festooned with keys on rings & strings that match the locks of innumerable hidey holes, save houses, previously robbed locales.
Gray Caps: A faction consisting of mushroom farmers, known for their facility at disposing of unwanted bodies via their dark and private grow caves.
Leviathan: A pit fighter, named after the demon-blooded ocean inhabitants. Has someone’s tooth stuck in their forehead. Mouth leaks black viscous liquid. Has probably had an unfortunate encounter with leviathan blood that has marked them in some way.