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Martin Ross

Author on Reedsy Prompts since Dec, 2021

Stories (122)

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352 Followers

330 Following

122 Stories

4927 karma pts

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Affective Defense

Martin Ross

Submitted to Contest #288

WOM-07 should never have emerged this early. The rest were dormant in the tunnels below, in the intricate labyrinth wrought to frustrate, to confound both those who’d pursued their flesh for eons etched into tribal memory and the New Ones that had intruded into this world as theirs had betrayed them and they sought fresh prey under heightened competitive pressure.WOM-07 had held tight to the stream line, where even during these harsh months, the waters offered up vegetative scrub, insects, the occasional snails he needed paradoxically to fue...

28 likes

A Spot of Tea: A Professor Deshpande Mystery

Martin Ross

Submitted to Contest #287

“A great idea should always be left to steep like loose tea leaves in a teapot for a while to make sure that the tea will be strong enough and the idea truly is a great one.” — Phoebe Stone“As long as my role begins and terminates in the kitchen, I am both honored and delighted,” Anand replied as he checked on the welfare of the gulab jamun. The macroeconomist nodded curtly to the saturated dumplings as he might a freshman who had successfully dissected Keynesian Theory. “Oh, and please confine your literary circle to the common areas.”“It’s...

40 likes

BOB

Martin Ross

Submitted to Contest #286

The Camp is an ideal place for secrets but no place for privacy or security. I stow it somewhere safe I can remember. That makes things both simpler and more complex.But they were coming, and I had no other options. The Nine had taken all that away.This world has never welcomed my kind, but although its purpose is to protect the Dwellers from us, the Camps offer us a refuge from their contempt and cruelty.I ask the one the Dwellers call “Cyclops” after some historical figure or mythical being. This is their way of putting us into a context t...

25 likes

The Carpenter Piece: A Tale of the Arts Department

Martin Ross

Submitted to Contest #286

“The ‘beast’ secession, offspring of the ‘dragon' Slavery, drawing in his train a third part of our national stars, was pierced with the deadly wound which could not be healed. It was the combat between Michael and Satan of Apocalyptic vision, re-enacted before the eyes of the nineteenth century…”Francis Bicknell CarpenterProfessor Thomas Skillruud was vaguely aware of the concept of Yelp, and, like so many conventions of the Information Age, he regarded it with the same disdain as Twitting and TickTock dancing. He could not and, if pressed,...

36 likes

The Bedevilment of Danny Webster: A Tale of the Arts Department

Martin Ross

Submitted to Contest #284

NOTE: Mature subject matter“I should have known better.”Melissa was sorry she’d brought the whole thing up.“Yeah, probably,” Professor Urquardt uttered. She should have let Zinna Garver slide until Monday. What should have been a simple “What the fuck is the matter with you, and how can we fix it quick?” pep talk had turned into a Sarah Jessica Parker therapy session, and Melissa blamed the Big V. Valentine’s Day, and, she guessed, the other one, too.“So, you’re done with him, right?” Melissa nonetheless persisted when Garver failed to slink...

25 likes

The Serpent We Know: A Holiday Tale of the Arts Department

Martin Ross

Submitted to Contest #284

“Could I get mansions covering ten thousand miles, I’d house all the poor scholars…”Du Fu “By the way, we’ve got New Year’s plans,” Wei Zhao announced as she pulled into the long drive in the campus fringe of Mulberry. Wei heard the entomologist sink into the upholstery.“I thought we were doing a peaceful evening of Huluween horror, Sichuan Palace and Papa John’s, and bringing 2025 in with a bang or maybe three,” Will sulked.“Now, that’s a Hallmark movie I’d watch,” the University’s youngest tenured prof mulled, waiting out the ailing garage...

19 likes

Claus and Effect: A Holiday Tale of the Arts Department

Martin Ross

Submitted to Contest #282

To the real Merlin Kennedy, who brought Black Santa to town…December 17, 1966Adams ParkMillington, Illinois“Why are you stopping me?” Santa asked calmly as the officer pulled him none too gently from the “sleigh.” If there were to be one cool head this frosty Saturday morning, it would be his.The boy was blonde and blue-eyed, like Officer Friendly in a Norman Rockwell painting or the fellows used to goose-step Jews off to the livestock cars.“No way in hell you’re gonna be in this parade today,” the cop stated, leaning in. “There’s only one S...

21 likes

Onset

Martin Ross

Submitted to Contest #281

“Creepy.” EmilieCoggins’ tone was flat, which means little in isolation. But as our “eyes” met, I registered an incongruity. I was new at this, indeed new at everything, and I logged it for further consideration as I developed a viable baseline. Incongruities may signal systemic anomalies, anomalies systemic dysfunction, and dysfunction the potential for systemwide malfunction and, without intervention, eventual breakdown.Until you factor in adolescence. Or onset adolescence.“I think it’s adorable.” SherylCoggins’ voice, on the other hand, w...

22 likes

Curtis and the Conciliatory Kill

Martin Ross

Submitted to Contest #278

“Of everything I’ve regretted over the past 30 years — and you know just how many — I regret most that I couldn’t have given you the one thing you begged me for when you needed me the most. I’ll live with that for the rest of my life, and even if you could forgive the rest, I know you’ll never forgive my leaving you in your pain. I just can’t face you — I’m the same weak man, the same coward you’ve always known me to be. I couldn’t give you the death you deserved. I’m so sorry.”It was his style — a miserable, tiny, meaningless “man” with del...

32 likes

Bob Barker and the Price of Cookies

Martin Ross

Submitted to Contest #275

If Bob Barker was dead, he apparently was making the most of it.Bev checked the date on the magazine, guessing this bundle of BLTNs (?) had gathered dust on some post office loading dock until some chucklehead’d awoke from their civil service coma.November 2024. She angrily brushed the white hair from her eyes as the early November winds buffeted the mailbox bank, then located the mailing label that cheapened the high-tone, heavy matte cover. Bev’s old stylist had been a pretentious little B with a stack of thick, chic, hoity Town and C...

27 likes

The Creature From the Undeveloped Interstate Right-of-Way

Martin Ross

Submitted to Contest #274

Reggie for once had brought home a truly intriguing, unique gift. The Brennans nonetheless were wholly unappreciative, to Sir Reginald Fox’s bewilderment and consternation.“Sweet holy FUCK!”Reggie had never fully grasped that a gift once spurned has little chance the second or third or sixth pass. The chipmunk had sparked mild approbation; the first robin of spring amused horror. The rabbit on Good Friday morning had surely left some psychic scar tissue on the kids, and after the crow turned up Halloween, Gary was mightily afraid Reggie had ...

27 likes

Noche de Muertos: A Tale of the Arts Department

Martin Ross

Submitted to Contest #274

Playa Del Carmen, Mexico/2012Malik stared Death in the eye.“Gracias, no,” Malik murmured, pulling his Bureau ID. “Gringos federales.”The eyes behind Death’s deep ocular orbits narrowed, and a hearty laugh erupted from beneath the clenched teeth. He slipped the fat, expertly rolled Havanas – illegal in the States, freely available in Quintana Roo – into his cloak. “Was that necessary?” Agent Drees sighed beside Malik. “How long you think before word gets out the feds are in town?”“Relax, Austin – get into the Día de los Muertos spirit,” ...

26 likes

Mr. XX

Martin Ross

Submitted to Contest #274

By the sixth parent, Mr. Grant was ready to toss it in for an evening of Little Caesar’s, the new Ryan Murphy gorefest on Hulu.Where their offspring were relentlessly candid, contemporary millennial parents were adept in prefatory prevarication. I’m an adamant opponent of censorship. This isn’t a racial thing. We take our child’s education very seriously. Our daughter’s needs always come first.He’d scheduled Anthony Cardell last. Despite the common perception, big pitchers actually tended to have the biggest ears, and Wil warily regarded the...

27 likes

Phenomenal

Martin Ross

Submitted to Contest #272

I knew the other three who’d come on board, but had never made the formal acquaintance. Nor from what I’d learned, would have cared to.The other guys, no idea. I use “guys” loosely, without gender assignment. Which isn’t a horrible thing — people more than ever are just kinda people, despite the plucky can-do dementia of the Proud Boys and rollers and Florida and guys like my two new “friends” who seemed to swing dicks with random glee. Today’s vast uncertainty liberates me from the subconscious “rules” of attraction or aggression and the tr...

33 likes

Day of Roux: A Mike Dodge Mystery

Martin Ross

Submitted to Contest #270

The roux is the foundation -- of any great stew, bisque, chowder, the velveteen béchamel your visiting cousin calls the “gravy” he found just a mite too boojie for his tastes. It’s the distinction between a minestrone and a pasta e fagiole and certainly the basis of any jambalaya you don’t want called out as a gumbo.**“You’re shitting me, right?”“I shit you not,” I pledged, sliding the cookie sheet into the oven. I guesstimated, as I had throughout my culinary career, and set the dial for 375. It was an old church oven – that’s to say a rest...

18 likes