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Center your story around someone who turns into the thing they’ve always hated.

Posted in Short Story on Sep 5, 2025

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✍️ 42 stories

Padrick

Winner of Contest #319 🏆

The clatter of swords rang out. Steel hissed against steel; wood cracked against bone. Boys stumbled through forms while their partners, the risen dead, moved with a rigid steadiness that would not tire or flinch. Their eyes were milked over; their skin pulled drum-tight.The captain barked sequences: high guard, turn the shoulder, sweep, step in. A boy’s blade knocked free, and the dead thing he faced did not chase the opening; only returned to ready stance. Mercy by command, not intention.High above, the long gallery threw a hard shadow ove...

80 likes 34 comments 34
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Vermin

Submitted to Contest #319

Darkness parted ahead of Sir Baristan, like waters before a ship. The murk was sliced apart by the wondrous effect of his armour. Enchantments etched into the metal created the fortunate side effect of a golden, glowing light, which emanated strongly from the full suit whenever it touched against his skin. The effect was strong enough to illuminate much of the underground cavern, allowing the army at his back to see a good distance forward, where normally all would be lost to the stone above. He winced whenever his eyes drifted up to the opp...

18 likes 10 comments 10
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Always a Part of Me

Submitted to Contest #319

She wasn’t really a witch. I mean she was, but she wasn’t. It was a nickname I used with Erin, my younger sister - and Mum never found out. Not once. Although maybe she knew, and just didn’t tell us. Even as a kid I knew it was a harsh assessment. Generally speaking, she was a model mother: Not many people ate real Spaghetti Bolognaise in the Seventies, but even to this day I’ve never had it from a can. Not once. This was the pattern that our lives followed as we grew into healthy, well-covered young women – and Mum never stopped delivering....

13 likes 2 comments 2
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Red Lipstick, White Noise

Submitted to Contest #319

The desert made her angry. Rachel stepped out of the rental car and squinted through the heat shimmer, regretting everything: the flight from Boston, the motel soap stinging her eyes, the email from her editor that started this whole descent into woo-woo hell. And now—this? A flying saucer-shaped building in the middle of nowhere, with a chalkboard out front offering “cosmic recalibration & solar harmonics.” Jesus. The Integratron stood like a sugar pill hallucination. White dome. Perfect symmetry. Not a line out of place, like it was bu...

13 likes 1 comment 1
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A Hero is Forged

Submitted to Contest #319

It was on the steps of the Temple of Heroes that Sigrun earned his everlasting glory. The Orc King, a brute named Gorag the Devourer, had led a horde of beasts from the Blackspire Mountains into the heart of the Valley of Mimir. Sigrun, standing alone at the temple's entrance, faced down the beast king. With a roar that shook the forests and the valley, he swung his Hammer of Mjolnir in a wide arc that hit its mark, smashing Gorath's demon skull to bits. Poisonous orc blood cascaded down the marble steps like a river, staining the sacred sto...

11 likes 2 comments 2
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Ain't No Sunshine When She's Gone

Submitted to Contest #319

God, you don’t know how badly I wish I could lie in the sun for a few hours, bake in the heat, and get a decent tan. But that’s reserved for the living.Where should I begin? All of my sentient life, I’ve had just one goal, one purpose that drove me forward: achieving the perfect tan. Maybe it all started with my name, Auburn Tanner. I won’t spend much time recounting my childhood. As a young girl, my first Barbie doll was Malibu Barbie, a perfectly tanned California blonde with a convertible. She was who I aspired to be. I don’t know exactly...

9 likes 2 comments 2
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What died in the east

Submitted to Contest #319

The boy turned at the clatter of Jan’s horse, bowed and brought a muddy hand to his muddy forehead. He smiled, and there was admiration in his eyes. They liked their soldiers here in Orenburg, the feeling of being protected, of knowing that when the uncivilized came washing over the frontier there would be rough men who would throw them back. But every bow, every sign of respect served only to remind Jan of what he’d done.Jan sat straight in his saddle. Behind him his three Cossacks were working through a conversation, with long breaks inter...

9 likes 3 comments 3
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Cold Blood Runs Deep

Submitted to Contest #319

Have you ever wanted to crawl out of your own skin? To just rip it to shred with no remorse for the consequences that will ensue afterwards. Like a snake, to be born a new? But this body my soul lives in is:Repulsive.Repugnant.Distasteful.I stared at my blurry reflection in front of my shattered mirror for what feels like hours. I am looking at my skin; pale, dead even. My hair still damped from my shower but the heavy fog from the extreme heat that came from it was still in the bathroom, which covered my true nature. I go wipe the mist from...

8 likes 2 comments 2
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Paragliding through Paradise Lost

Submitted to Contest #319

Elias Veyra had grown up in a house where justice was only a word. His father, a high-court judge, was admired in public but monstrous at home. His father tormented him , mixing it with fists and words until Elias's life became a prison gilded in gold. The public was too blind to see the cruelty festering behind the closed doors. He beat Elias when he stumbled, mocked him with the fates of the men he sentenced, and once forced him to watch a beggar plead in court only to laugh as he signed his imprisonment. Elias swore that day he would neve...

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When Fear Knocks

Submitted to Contest #319

When Fear KnocksOn a gloomy autumn evening, when the wind made passersby bundle deeper into their scarves and the maples along the avenue traded summer for red and gold, I was born in a New York City hospital—earlier than the doctors had expected. Fluorescent lights hummed; someone whispered; someone else wrote my name on a plastic bracelet that slid loose around my wrist.The verdict was uncertain: “Her heart is weak. Let’s wait until tomorrow. Then it will be clear.”But I survived. My parents named me Emily.From the time I was a toddler, th...

8 likes 2 comments 2
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The Mirrors Edge

Submitted to Contest #319

Marcus Delacroix had perfected the art of becoming invisible. Twenty-three years of stalking celebrities, politicians, and anyone else unlucky enough to stumble into the public eye had taught him how to blend into crowds, disappear behind pillars, and emerge from shadows like smoke given form. His telephoto lens was an extension of his body, his finger on the shutter a trigger he pulled without conscience."They choose this life," he'd rationalize to his editor at Spotlight Weekly, sliding another memory card across the cluttered desk. "The m...

8 likes 7 comments 7
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The Drowned Sailor

Submitted to Contest #319

A raging tempest lures poor sailors to the Tavern’s old. They seek shelter from the wailing wind and angry waters. The storm surrounds them like a haunting melody, as the glow of the Tavern beckons them inside. The Drowned Sailor Tavern has served folks for many years and stands as a staple in this seaside town. As someone walks past the mismatched chairs toward the crooked bar, a quiet melody drifts from the corner. An old bard plays a beat-up fiddle, worn by the years, with strings missing, but the notes are still resonant. His face darken...

8 likes 1 comment 1
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The First Litch

Submitted to Contest #319

Baribus hated the elves.It was a personal conviction of his, and his views were not ones to be taken well by others, so he kept his thoughts to himself. Many of the students at the Mistwood’s Academy of the Mystical Arts were prone to gushing about ‘the virtue and wisdom’ of the elves, for allowing other races to peruse their wealth of knowledge. His views on the elves were in the vast minority.His views had nothing to do with their race, and everything to do with their immortality.He turned the page on the tome he’d borrowed from the librar...

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Mercy Is Death

Submitted to Contest #319

“Lock the doors! Draw your fangs from their sheaths! They’re too fast for guns!” “They’ve already made it upstairs!” My brothers run to the front, so I do the same, squatting into my kill-ready stance, just as had been beaten into me. My knees tremble. The real thing is much more terrifying than training scenarios. I don’t want to do this! My brothers shout something back at my father, their blue and white patterned cloaks looked as if they were flowing in the wind from their sporadic movements. They shuffled back behind me, taking the trian...

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Shaping Up

Submitted to Contest #319

Charlie bounded into the kitchen knotting his tie.“Hi, hon,” he said, swatting Miranda's shoulder so heartily that her coffee slopped onto the table. “What’ve you got lined up for today?”Miranda eyed him. He was never usually boisterous first thing in the morning and his jollity seemed forced. It was also unusual for him to show any interest in her activities.“I don’t know yet,” she said, mopping the table with her napkin. “I’ll go out somewhere for a while. Agneska is coming today.”Agneska, their Polish cleaning lady, was very set in her wa...

5 likes 0 comments 0
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