A Word of Explanation  

Samuel Clemens stared at the computer screen in front of him. It was almost as white and blank as his mind. He had been sitting like this for at least an hour, stripped of ideas. Then, as suddenly as a blender turning on, he had an idea, but as soon as he got done typing the first paragraph he thought of another great idea, then another…

The Monsters of Midnight 

Darrik lay on the old queen bed, completely alone in the dark, musty attic bedroom. He jerked up. There was another sound accompanying the low moaning of the wind, a scratching from somewhere beneath him.

The Diplomats of the Round Table

Lancelot sighed, thinking for the thousandth time that he was ahead of his day. Every time he brought up his Big Idea, King Arthur would ramble on and on about his fancy sword and his divine authority.

Violating the Hippocratic Oath 

Barrton didn’t know why he had always hated the dentist. He didn’t know it yet, but after today, he would have a reason, a very good reason.

The Weather Balloon 

Joshua Higgons, in a moment of confusion, accidentally slipped his keys into the wrong pocket. After a moment, they fell silently out a hole and landed unnoticed onto the pavement behind him. This little mistake, Higgons would soon find, would forever alter the course of his subsequently ordinary life.

In Search of the Last Circus 

I used to be Claud the Clown, the best performer in the Buckingham Circus. I used to be. That was before I dropped the throwing torch on the flammable stage floor. 

The Curse of Curiosity

Muffy liked to sniff things. When she wasn’t tearing up curtains or licking herself, she was smelling every single one of the spoons in the silverware drawer, or something else. Today she was going to sniff the new thing her owners had set out behind the refrigerator. It was a small wooden plank, with a spring, some bent metal rods, and a chunk of cheese on one end. This was going to be fun!

Therapy for Hungry Guinea Pigs

George Morris was a psychologist. One of the best, he thought, as he looked out over the city far below. From the top of the building where he stood, the landscape looked normal. But if he were to look closer, he would see that something was terribly wrong. The fate of the city would soon be in his hands.   

The Road Not Traveled

Josephus Barnious, the once great explorer, hung suspended by a pole over the cannibals’ fire. He had seen worse. However, this little dilemma had taught him an important lesson. The road less traveled was not always better, but it had made all the difference.

The Twelfth M&M

The fluorescent bulb of the dusty Avalon basement cast contrasting shadows on Dr. Willard’s lab coat. All decent people at this hour would be sleeping, but Willard was not a decent person. He would try again. The experiment’s gears, levers and glass beakers needed only a few more adjustments. Despite the power company’s threats to cut him off if he brought the grid down one more time, he would try yet again. Perhaps on this, the twelfth attempt, the small chocolate candies would serve his crooked purpose.

The Gordian Knot

Alexander the Great sat on his large black horse and prepared to enter Gordian. He didn’t know why this little kingdom was giving him so much trouble, but he was prepared to do anything to put down this rebellion. He would soon find himself tangled up in an adventure, but one knot more than he could handle.

The Road Trip

Greenland was the furthest thing from Frank Houger’s mind. He would soon regret tuning out in the middle of geography class.

The Middle of Nowhere

At this moment Jordan Donbury was asking the question all truck drivers ask sometime in their lives. “Where am I?” At the edge of his hearing, he could just make out the rumble of the slowly beating drums and a myriad of shouts that sounded like war cries. Where was he?

Between The Lines

Inside the old, old library, in a dusty dark corner lies a book. The cover is torn, and moths have made work on the pages that now rot on the termite infested table. No one visits the library now, not anymore. But if one were to visit it, despite the superstition, and find that old volume, the mystery that lies behind the boarded windows would be known. The tale is not a happy one, nor is it easy to find. Sometimes the truth is not obvious. Sometimes one has to look between the lines.

The Squirrels of Dilvender 

Squirrel number 10, Chuckney, eyed the target below. A flash of light from a nearby tree in the park met his eye. That was the signal. Squirrel number 6, Wallis, jumped with a ferocious squeak and landed on the man sitting below. The man looked up just in time to see a bunch of fur hit his face with a smack! Chuckney raced down the tree trunk and grabbed the bag of honey roasted cashews from the man’s startled hands. Now the others came rushing in to complete the raid. The squirrels always enjoyed harassing the residents of Dilvender, and soon they would have the chance of a lifetime. The president was scheduled to arrive this afternoon.

The EndSamuel Clemens paused and looked at his work, satisfied that he’d written quite enough. He didn’t know it yet, but soon he would be pressured by his readers to actually finish all of these beginnings. Of course he had published these introductions with no intention of their continuation and no conception of how they might end. He would soon be over his head with unwritten work and enslaved to his ruthless audience.