Herbert surveyed the battle raging before him. Never had he seen his living room in such disarray. The coffee table, seven degrees askew, was at war with his sofa and chaise. The casualties were everywhere, as the legroom between sofa and table had practically been murdered, and the rug underneath was suffering its death throes as it bunched up under the strain.

With the furniture righted, and the correct layout restored, Herbert knew all that would remain would be his PTSD.

Test day had arrived. Paul entered the arena with overwhelming trepidation. Failure today would mean death.

In any case, he looked forward to graduating to middle school.

Captain Fletcher of her Majesty’s Royal Navy gallantly stood before the tribunal. If he was aware that he faced court-martial, whipping, and possibly even death, he showed no sign of it in his stoic demeanor.

Years later, it was learned that the true reason for his constant failures was that he just really enjoyed using the word scuppered.

Seagulls arced lazy turns as an angry ocean pounded my listing fishing boat. Separated, the submerged boat lights cast a green glow around me, making the ocean even darker as the light trailed into abyss. Floating, my thoughts went to all life in the ocean, reacting, surviving, inching slowly along the ooze and undulating mid-water with goals ingrained. Ocean smell, thick with sea spray and sargassum, cradled me like a childless mother. Dipping below the horizon, the boat disappeared, sunset style, leaving me with only the immensity of space. Gazing at weightless gulls, the blue mire pulled me gently home.

From Guest Contributor Wes Keller

The students were blindfolded as they entered the arena, and the roaring crowd left them nearly deaf as well. When the bell sounded indicating they were allowed to uncover their eyes, they found an array of weapons waiting for them.

Not many people realize that Julius Caesar first sprang to fame as a winner on Rome’s most popular reality show, Juvenile Gladiators.

Dave looked at the dead body and expected a measure of remorse that never materialized. He realized the man’s death had been completely warranted.

In this case, the pile of overdue library books stacked high in the corner gave Dave all the reason he needed to kill Mr. O’Leary.

In my visit to the pharmaceuticals factory, I discovered that there was no black dot serial killer. The black dots themselves were the murderer. It was a virus that was being manufactured as a biological weapon and it had somehow leaked out of one of the containment units.

In the end, I died alone.

No one could remember what the pharmaceuticals factory was built for, other than to pollute the entire city with noxious fumes and wastewater. It was owned by Rufus T. Dowling, the reclusive textiles baron who at one time controlled more than a third of the city’s real estate.

Once I had learned the truth about the black dot killings, the first question I wanted answered was whether Dowling knew about the plot. That’s why I drove to his mansion on Pine Hill.

Every victim of the past month had been found with the same black dot tattooed to his or her forehead. We reported it to all the usual departments, thinking we must have a serial killer or cult on our hands. But each of the deaths appeared random, with a variety of causes and nothing linking them together.

The captain was mad at me so I was assigned the desk, going through all the case files. I was the one who discovered the connection, that all the victims had visited a certain pharmaceuticals factory on the east side before their deaths.

No one noticed as the epidemic became incipient. Even as people started dying from the new strain of bacteria, the entire society was oblivious.

This is no solace for me.

Today’s story deviates in that it is exactly 150 words instead of 100. It’s something of an epic.