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	A Man of Action - Jeff Ryan A Man of Action It happened in Iceland because of the iridium in the soil, and in the town of Unkinghaaryorme because that was where a dying old witch placed a spell. The recently dead began to come back to life as the last hours of the witch’s life passed during the night. Sigurjon Harkmansson the hermit snowplow driver noticed the change, as did everyone else in town. Thirty bodies from the morgue and funeral homes stumbled to the streets, grabbing at people to help them stand, stumbling tow... Keywords: horror; Jeff Ryan; zombie Downloads: 50 Average rating: (0 review)
	A Wonderful New Beginning - Jeff Ryan A Wonderful New Beginning Harry lived a humble life, one cut short by injury. He developed swimmer’s shoulder, a routine injury akin to tennis elbow. But the surgery to repair it went wrong. More surgeries did not heal the injury. To combat a possible paralysis, Harry went under the knife one last time. He honestly thought he would die on that table: he had told God he was coming. But God apparently had other plans for Harry... Keywords: horror; Jeff Ryan; zombie Downloads: 48 Average rating: (0 review)
	The Church of the CC Redeemer - Jeff Ryan Last month, three women named Miriam, Majidah, and Anumati were among a hundred people who shuffled into the Church of the CC Redeemer’s tent in leg irons. One by one, they were baptized, forsaking any other gods or viewpoints they might have to be baptized in the eternal love of Jesus Christ, their personal savior. Then, they waited in their cells. When the full moon came, for three straight nights, the brand-new Baptists weeped and celebrated and praised Jesus’s name... Keywords: horror; audio; microfiction; short stories; werewolves Downloads: 49 Average rating: (0 review)
	El Cielo - Jeff Ryan El Cielo They were actually pearly gates, Rosalita thought. Real pearls, too. The abalone and gold patterns were exactly as she hoped for such a magnificent gate. And St. Peter was there, too, and he was in the white robe with a golden tie just as she told everyone. “You have been an exceptional woman all your life,” St. Peter exclaimed, “and the Kingdom of Heaven is yours to enter.” Inside was breathtakingly gorgeous, and Rosalita began to cry... Keywords: horror; Jeff Ryan; hell; el cielo Downloads: 38 Average rating: (0 review)
	Hold Your Breath - Jeff Ryan “Not many people drive by the Old Camden Cemetery,” Abner said, “not since the four-lane turned traffic away from Old Camden Road. So when a car does come by, be ready for it.” Lushana nodded her head at this. She was learning what to expect in Old Camden. Abner had been here at least two hundred years. Lushana was new: she joined two weeks ago when she fell during cheerleader auditions. And she wanted to go visit her friends and family... Keywords: horror; graveyards; microfiction; short stories Downloads: 55 Average rating: (0 review)
	Shuttered - Jeff Ryan John Choi hated passing the 93rd floor on his window-washing scaffold, because of the shutters. Every other floor in the skyscraper had windows running the length of the outside: it was a lot of work to keep clean, but it was consistent. On 93, one of the windows was welded shut with massive steel plates bolted into the frame of the building. Behind that was a thick safe, with walls two feet deep in all directions... Keywords: horror; haunted houses; microfiction; short stories Downloads: 28 Average rating: (0 review)
	The Haunted Radiator - Jeff Ryan After 20 years as a plumber, Erich Rodick had never heard radiators as noisy as Mrs. Ecaterina Zina’s. They were steam radiators, which frequently get noisy when the hot steam meets the condensed water. Erich went to start bleeding them off, but Mrs. Zina insisted, in her old-country accent, that he could not remove any of the liquid from the radiators today. “It won’t hurt the radiator any, and if too much water comes out we’ll fill it back up,” he told her... Keywords: horror; haunted houses; microfiction; short stories Downloads: 47 Average rating: (0 review)
	The Shark and the NINJA - Jeff Ryan The Shark and the NINJA As a loanshark, Vic got the people the banks turned down. But his clients weren’t ready to give up their dream of a house, or a business, or a jetski. Vic helped that dream come true: this was America! People could buy whatever they wanted! Usually he could wedge most people into an adjustable-rate mortgage, or an interest-only loan. It got them what they wanted. It might ruin their credit, but their credit was already ruined if they were talking to him... Keywords: Jeff Ryan; horror; sharks Downloads: 29 Average rating: (0 review)
	Toys in the Attic - Jeff Ryan Each breath Anthony Loeman took flowed up through his dust mask and fogged his glasses. By alternating between looking and breathing, he crawled through the eaves on the right side of the large mansion, rewiring the upstairs. His knees killed from resting only on the joists. He dragged behind him a coil of thick yellow wire, some tools, and a bag of racist dolls. Anthony found them among the insulation, and recalled his grandmother saying her wonderful dolls from childhood were still somewhere i... Keywords: horror; haunted houses; microfiction; short stories Downloads: 54 Average rating: (0 review)
	Abracadaver - Jeff Ryan horror, diseases Keywords: horror; diseases Downloads: 53 Average rating: (0 review)
	A Cooperation of Souls - Jeff Ryan Walking home from high school, Ethan walked into a spider web by the stop sign. His knees tangled into another web by the newspaper box. These were well-trafficed areas: didn’t spiders know to spin webs where the bugs were, not the people? It was a dewy afternoon, and so Ethan saw the next two webs above the sidewalk. The drops of water clung to the sticky silk spiral hanging of their razor-straight radial lines... Keywords: horror; microfiction; short stories; spiders Downloads: 51 Average rating: (0 review)
	Angry Mob - Jeff Ryan The Grand Duchy of Lithuania received word of a witch in the hamlet of Binhulac, and sent four orthodox Christian clerics out to deal with it. The old religions of the towns were mostly gone, and the villagers safely experiencing Christ’s majesty. But a few outsiders in each village refused to convert. When something bad happened, then, they were responsible for it. The four clerics planned on either converting the witch, or killing her... Keywords: horror; microfiction; witches; short stories Downloads: 78 Average rating: (0 review)
	Anticancer Sticks - Jeff Ryan Anticancer Sticks The worlds of medicine and big tobacco shared a stage recently. Research into alternative uses for the weedlike tobacco plant, which has drained a hundred million bucks in research, bore fruit no one could have expected. Advanced geneticists succeeded at cross-breeding the tobacco plant with shark and aloe alleles. The result was an ironic miracle cure: perfect health in a coffin nail... Keywords: Jeff Ryan; horror; sharks Downloads: 51 Average rating: (0 review)
	A Pox on You - Jeff Ryan horror, diseases Keywords: horror; diseases Downloads: 40 Average rating: (0 review)
	Arania’s Web - Jeff Ryan Wilbur wasn’t a piglet anymore. He was 306 pounds of hog, a full hundred pounds heavier than the other pigs ready for slaughter. All Zuckerman could see was a walking $500 bill, depreciating in value with each day of life. “Some pig” or not, Wilbur had to go. Fern would hopefully be too busy with boys at the high school to even notice. The day of slaughter came. Zuckerman prepared the killing room, and headed out to the barn... Keywords: spiders; microfiction; short stories; horror Downloads: 78 Average rating: (0 review)
	Boom Mike - Jeff Ryan Actors are incredibly brave. They practice their craft on stage, refining the art of revealing themselves with someone else's words but their own emotions. That bravery is needed for anyone who heads to Los Angeles to try to get into motion pictures. The casting directors there are looking for charisma, and a pretty face, and a standout delivery, but most of all they're looking for bravery. For those actors they cast won't just be sharing the screen with an imposing and intimidating seven-figure... Keywords: horror; spiders; microfiction; short stories Downloads: 75 Average rating: (0 review)
	Butcher Paper - Jeff Ryan “Hi, I’m Emerald, I’ll be your server today,” Emerald told the dour teenagers she was serving. She wrote her name on the butcher paper tablecloth in purple. They were dressed in black, and they had white powder on their faces, and the guys had black nail polish. The girls had ankhs. Emerald saw these kids hanging out in the food court sometimes, buying hamsters for $10 and then drowning them in the wishing well... Keywords: horror; witches; microfiction; short stories Downloads: 86 Average rating: (0 review)
	Camel Spiders - Jeff Ryan Arnie and Dave thought they lucked out when they were told of their relatively safe assignment in Iraq. Relief soon turned to boredom, and they made bets to pass the time. Arnie bet that before they rotated assignments they’d find a camel spider, a legendarily huge arachnid that clamped underneath camels and grew large sucking their blood. Dave said it was a rumor, that the spiders were only an inch or two long, and technically not even spiders... Keywords: horror; spiders; microfiction; short stories; iraq Downloads: 190 Average rating: (0 review)
	Candy Coating - Jeff Ryan Wanda swore she had been tricked by some kid on Halloween. They were supposed to come once to her house, ONCE. Yet the anonymous eight-year olds in their Yu-Gi-Oh and Scream and Batman outfits came by again and again, the same store-bought costumes, the same distant parents back on the sidewalk waving. How did she know they weren’t the same three kids coming by over and over again? And it had been like this for years, all of these masked kids stuffing her candy in their mouths... Keywords: Halloween; horror; short story; microfiction Downloads: 69 Average rating: (0 review)
	Cross My Heart - Jeff Ryan Cross My Heart The promises made as adults aren’t true promises, because adults know the lack of consequences if they break one. That wasn’t the case for Nathan, who at age 13 hadn’t heard much kid-talk due to his home-schooling. Cousins of his came for the weekend: Nathan sensed they didn’t like him. They thought his parents and he were religious nuts. The cousins showed him a secret videotape they brought with them... Keywords: school; horror; Jeff Ryan Downloads: 56 Average rating: (0 review)
	Dermal Denticles - Jeff Ryan Dermal Denticles Wouter was the world’s biggest shark fan, had to be. He knew about their electrical sixth sense, their continual rows of teeth, and their dominance of the oceans. Watched Shark Week every year! Wouter wanted a firsthand experience, though: Wouter wanted a shark bite. His friends called him insane for this, but were they shark geeks? Did they know a shark’s liver was a quarter of its body weight? Wouter also knew sharks did not actually like the taste of people... Keywords: horror; sharks; Jeff Ryan Downloads: 72 Average rating: (0 review)
	Devil’s Night in Bloomfield Hills - Jeff Ryan Vernon was only nine, but he had heard about Devil’s Night. In Detroit, on the day before Halloween, you set fires. The poor destroyed the property of anyone dumb or poor enough to be in the city. Other places just called it Mischief Night, and kids pulled pranks. But not Detroit. That was why Vernon’s mom accepted the new Bloomfield Hills job, cleaning up for a big mansion. Vernon and his mom would get to live in the mansion, but would be the only black or working-class family in town... Keywords: Halloween; horror; short story; microfiction Downloads: 411 Average rating: (0 review)
	Disinterred - Jeff Ryan During the start of Boston’s Central Artery/Tunnel project, the “Big Dig,” the tiny Chilton Burying Ground had to be moved. It dated back to the witchcraft hearings, and hadn’t been used in centuries, so its disinterment was approved. A hush settled over a gathered crowd as the first dirt-caked wooden box was moved by crane. It splintered apart in its net; nothing fell out. As more graves were uncovered, they, too were found to be light of their cargo... Keywords: horror; microfiction; short stories; graveyards Downloads: 48 Average rating: (0 review)
	Dress Up as What You Fear - Jeff Ryan horror, vampires Keywords: horror; vampires Downloads: 120 Average rating: (0 review)
	From Kennedy’s Lips - Jeff Ryan As a boy, Harrison Donaldson lay his palm on his grandfather’s closed hands during the open-casket funeral. As he touched his first dead body, he saw the dead man’s memories of his final moments: a peaceful hospital bed, surrounded by family. He had a gift. Harrison fought in Korea, went to school on the GI bill, and became a funeral director. He was uniquely able to interpret the deceased’s wishes... Keywords: graveyard; horror; microfiction; short stories Downloads: 50 Average rating: (0 review)
	Here With Me - Jeff Ryan Here With Me Keywords: horror; ghosts Downloads: 78 Average rating: (0 review)
	Lafayette County - Jeff Ryan Lafayette County Quentin McDonald and his parents were on a road trip from Atlanta down to Disney, one last attempt to set the boy straight before military school. Quentin’s dad went in to buy gas off of Route 75 in Lafayette County. It was a place with lots of dead gators tacked everywhere. He came out after paying with an amazed look on his face. “Don’t go in there, it’s not something you want to see,” he told his son, although Quentin couldn’t imagine something so grisly he didn�... Keywords: horror; school; Jeff Ryan Downloads: 166 Average rating: (0 review)
	Lessons from a Lifetime of Lycanthropy - Jeff Ryan --Never go to the tropics. The moon pulls harder there. --Set up a safe den. Your instincts will return you there period after period. --Keep the den stocked with sanitary napkins. No one tests the blood in tampons. --Spend your non-period days associating human flesh with electrical shocks. Your body will remember despite its change. --Never shackle yourself, especially not by the hand. We’ve all seen what animals do to survive when a limb is trapped... Keywords: werewolves; horror; short stories; microfiction Downloads: 58 Average rating: (0 review)
	Nosocomial - Jeff Ryan horror, diseases Keywords: horror; diseases Downloads: 53 Average rating: (0 review)
	Nutritional Information - Jeff Ryan Dorothy sat down at her desk at work and tore open the wrapper of the candy bar, disregarding the nutritional information, and bit. It was just as the news reports claimed: an honest-to-goodness chocolate bar, with caramel and a little crispy bits and a cookie center that crunched like a pretzel. The Century bar wasn’t outstanding: there was a reason why it was leftover in the office Halloween candy bin, after the Snickers and Butterfingers were gone... Keywords: Halloween; horror; short story; microfiction Downloads: 142 Average rating: (0 review)
	Passenger Pigeons, Dodos, and Great Auks - Jeff Ryan horror, diseases Keywords: horror; diseases Downloads: 79 Average rating: (0 review)
	Playing Grown-Up - Jeff Ryan Pauline thought she might have misheard out of exhaustion, since October was of course the busiest month for costume shops. So she asked the ordinary-looking man in front of her to say it again. There was something very strange about the way he talked. It was almost like a lack of strangeness that seemed odd, almost emotionless. “Repeat, I would like a brown wig for my head. Caucasian-colored paint for my face... Keywords: Halloween; horror; short story; microfiction Downloads: 1,027 Average rating: (0 review)
	Scalper - Jeff Ryan Scalper Denny loved it when the White Sox were in Cleveland. His $30 tickets went for $40, the $50 for $90, and the baseliners went for two bills. Cleveland fans would pay handsomely for a decent blood rivalry – the Browns moving to Baltimore, the Mistake by the Lake, paying good money to hear “Cleveland Rocks” for the rest of their lives. But Denny couldn’t move one of his last four tickets: the other three he soaked to some hicks for about 250% of their face value... Keywords: horror; baseball; short stories; microfiction Downloads: 87 Average rating: (0 review)
	Seventh Inning Stretch - Jeff Ryan Seventh Inning Stretch Shane and Irwin were two of the Milwaukee Brewer fans who became quite angry when the beer stopped flowing, come the seventh inning stretch. They freely admitted to being disgusting dirtbags, and their love of baseball was the only good thing about them. Usually one or two fouled-out balls would arc backwards and land up in the brown seats in the far mezzanine. This game, though, seven had blooped back, one per inning on average... Keywords: baseball; horror; story stories; microfiction Downloads: 115 Average rating: (0 review)
	Sneaking A Butt - Jeff Ryan Daily Scares -- Sneaking a Butt Keywords: horror; vampire Downloads: 77 Average rating: (0 review)
	Southpaw Conversion - Jeff Ryan Like so many single-a-ball pitchers, Harry James was a junkballer. His many pitches creaked over the plate with speeds that wouldn’t get you pulled over going through town. At 31, his right arm wasn’t getting any younger, and it wasn’t learning any tricks to increase heat. Harry’s friends figured he always cracked jokes because he was nervous of being cut. Then, one night Harry took the mound in the eighth, and started fingering a fastball in his left hand... Keywords: horror; baseball; microfiction; short stories Downloads: 53 Average rating: (0 review)
	Speak and Spell - Jeff Ryan Clutching his most recent spelling bee trophy, Manoj leaned back into the middle seat of his parents’ minivan and, for the first time in his life, smiled. He had witnessed other boys and girls his age smiling after successfully spelling a word. Manoj always thought they were simply concentrating open-mouthed. But the upturned lips were out of happiness of achievement. Manoj looked to his parents, who never smiled either... Keywords: horror; audio; Jeff Ryan; microfiction; short stories; school Downloads: 156 Average rating: (0 review)
	Spell Check - Jeff Ryan Aly scribbled her notes down in her spiral notebook, and a green line appeared under one misspelled word. Aly corrected it with her pencil, and the green line went away. Neato! This new incantation to catching errors in her writing was working wonderfully. It wasn’t even difficult. The computer guys did the hard part when they wrote word processing systems. All Aly did was magick the computer code to work for paper, instead of a big heavy laptop... Keywords: horror; microfiction; witches; short stories Downloads: 49 Average rating: (0 review)
	Super Fun - Jeff Ryan Amber’s parents were mean. They wouldn’t let her go out and play. The family was living near to a super-fun playground, but Amber’s mom made her walk right home from school every day. Amber was a good girl, and she didn’t like lying to her mom, but sometimes moms can be wrong. So Amber started taking a half-hour to get home, but it was only a fifteen-minute walk. The other fifteen minutes of each day were spent in the super-fun playground... Keywords: horror; school; microfiction; short stories Downloads: 91 Average rating: (0 review)
	The Door to Hell - Jeff Ryan The Door to Hell Yesterday the door was the men’s room door in a restaurant outside of Islamabad, Pakistan. Today, it is a delivery door next to a loading dock for a factory in Sao Paulo, Brazil. Tomorrow, perhaps the minor demons will relocate it to a revolving door in Cape Town, South Africa leading into a department store. The first nineteen people who pass through the door on its designated day will suffer horrible fate for the remainder of their lifetimes... Keywords: horror; jeff ryan; hell Downloads: 81 Average rating: (0 review)
	The Family Chiroptera - Jeff Ryan Mike Ramonez’s attic was filled with little leaves, hanging from the ceiling. Mike touched some, and they turned into moths that flitted around his head. But they weren’t leaves, or moths: they were bats. He couldn’t have bats here for his housewarming/family reunion! A pest control guy estimated it would cost $2300 to seal up the eaves at night so that the bats couldn’t get in and out anymore... Keywords: horror; haunted houses; microfiction; short stories Downloads: 60 Average rating: (0 review)
	The Gallows Bordello - Jeff Ryan horror, ghosts Keywords: horror; ghosts Downloads: 117 Average rating: (0 review)
	The Ghost in the Gray Flannel Suit - Jeff Ryan The Ghost in the Gray Flannel Suit Keywords: horror; ghosts Downloads: 69 Average rating: (0 review)
	The Last Diurnals - Jeff Ryan horror, vampires Keywords: horror; vampires Downloads: 66 Average rating: (0 review)
	The New Tartan - Jeff Ryan There was a tartan by an enormous yew tree next to the river, but it was a plaid Cameron Mackenzie had never seen before. He knew the distinct plaid patterns of his Mackenzie clan, of course, as well as the other locals: Ogilvy, Keith, Macleod, Macthomas. But the grey undercheck and white overcheck, without a hint of green or red: this was new to him. Who was this newcomer, this Sassenach in the lands of clan Mackenzie? Could his gray and white be one of the Mackenzie’s many tartans, which mix... Keywords: horror; microfiction; spiders; short stories; scotland; scottish Downloads: 72 Average rating: (0 review)
	The Piecemeal Soldier - Jeff Ryan The Piecemeal Soldier The exploding shell hit a gas canister, and Sergeant Cominski’s squad was cut into pieces. They were nothing but assorted body parts littering the mud of France. That didn’t stop them, though. Sarge Cominski’s foot gave marching orders, and the parts of the other soldiers obeyed. Private Drucker, the coward, straightened out his knees and hobbled over to Cominski’s foot... Keywords: horror; Jeff Ryan; Zombie Downloads: 39 Average rating: (0 review)
	The Prophet Norbert - Jeff Ryan Carole was new to the neighborhood, couldn’t even find a CVS yet, and wasn’t sure what trick-or-treaters in Arizona would be like compared to Nebraska. When her car wasn’t egged the night before, and her tree stayed free of toilet paper, she considered it a good sign. Maybe it was just from living on a cul-de-sac. Funny: when she told her coworker where she lived, he called it a cult-de-sac. The kids started to appear around five on Halloween while she was waiting for the cable man... Keywords: Halloween; horror; short story; microfiction Downloads: 35 Average rating: (0 review)
	The Sandtiger Sisters - Jeff Ryan The Sandtiger Sisters The daughter threshed her way through her birth sack, virgin teeth polished from warm fluids, and started to tear into the flesh of the womb. Her brother and sister bumped into her, in their permanent uterine daze. She bit the male on his small snout, then again. The third time her teeth connected, and the snout was off. She returned to biting the womb wall, looking for a way out... Keywords: horror; Daily Scares; Jeff Ryan; sharks Downloads: 70 Average rating: (0 review)
	The Seventh Foot - Jeff Ryan Mike Corrander was distracted by his Braves’ lousy performances in the final innings of a game against Boston. He kept on digging the grave beyond the standard six feet. His boss Mr. Quay said never to waste labor and dig deeper, the old cheapskate. Mike went down seven full feet before noticing that he was too deep. Then he hit old wood. Was Mr. Quay burying bodies on top of other bodies? There were some nasty rumors about the Quay family: this sort of “efficacious” use of cemetery land w... Keywords: graveyard; horror; microfiction; short stories Downloads: 49 Average rating: (0 review)
	The Third Wish - Jeff Ryan The Third Wish Martin's first wish to the djinn was to die. It had taken Martin a decade to track down the 6th-century amphorae in which the djinn’s essence was trapped. During that time Martin had destroyed the lives of those around him, and grown to hate the very power he seeked. He first killed out of self-preservation, then greed. Greed was another word for self-preservation. Only a fool would choose to be the back instead of the knife... Keywords: horror; hell Downloads: 121 Average rating: (0 review)