Flash Club October 19

[Litopian]

From Halloween Shalloween
---

The night bus can’t turn left, which is a pain in the arse, ‘cause this bloke next to me is really starting to freak me out. I mean, it’s bad enough being on a night bus in the first place, I mean, what is Uber playing at thinking they can charge that much?

What the fuck is this bloke doing? Oi, I say, pack it in. I say it really loud so people can hear but you know what night buses are like. He says, brains, all fucking zombie-like and he’s all over me and I’m saying look, fuck off mate, and another bloke gets up and comes over and is all like, is this man bothering you miss, and I’m like, I’m perfectly capable of looking after myself thank you very much and the bloke says only trying be helpful, and like, you want to watch your mouth missy and then, and then guess what? The zombie bloke gets up and bites the other bloke right in the face. There’s fucking screaming and blood everywhere and the bus runs off the road onto the pavement and it all goes fucking nuts.

And that is how the zombie apocalypse starts. For me anyway.

 

[Litopian]

From Bus Boy Boogie
---

‘No, I’m not turning left.’ Who’d have thought that buses can talk. The bus turns right. ‘I’m in charge now.’ The bus is in charge. 'I own you all.' It owns them all. The driver yanks the steering wheel left but the bus continues to race to the right. Fifty people scream. Jenny pees her pants. Bob wishes he’d taken the tube, wishes he hadn’t complained about the bus' tardiness. Five minute. He wishes he hadn't insulted at the driver. The bus heard. Since when do buses have ears? Bob wouldn't have used the 'F' word. The bus got annoyed. The bus slammed its doors shut. No more exit, and then it changed the number on its front. Number 47 to Wanstead? Not anymore. 666. The bus zoomed off, spitting diesel, angry, and now the bus won't stop until it arrives in Hell.

 

[Litopian]

From Killer Drac
---

The night bus can't turn left. The fancy dress party is the next right. Dracula swings the big red double decker into the small cul-de-sac with no idea how to get it back out again. He didn't plan the transport properly when he stole the damn thing. He certainly didn't plan to bite through the drivers jugular when he car-jacked or bus-jacked it - whatever the term may be. It's the costumes fault. He sorta got carried away with it. The same thing happened on New Years Eve when he attended that shindig in Newcastle dressed as an Italian Mobster. He killed eight people with a Tommy Gun that night. A personal best by all accounts. With the bus driver taken care of, so far tonight - it's one down and a party full to go.
He pulls up on the curb, gets out and carefully licks the blood off his special fangs. Custom made just for this evening’s shenanigans. Hearing the music, he cautiously enters the house. Frankenstein is stood in the hall with two dead mummies at his feet and a menacing grin. Dracula’s trailing by one already... Game on!

 

[Litopian]

From Witchy McGlitchy
---

It’s half seven already and the weirdo behind me is driving me nuts with his continual tip-tip-tapping on the window. Morse code for morons. But I’ll be getting out soon, my turn is up here on the left. I check the basket to make sure my hat and scarf are still tucked in there beside the kitty I found beside the post box, and stand, glad to leave the percussing pea-brain who is working himself up into a frenzy, hair on end.

But wait!

Hold on!

That’s my turn back there!

I make my way up unsteadily through the lurching bus and rap on the driver’s glass. Pulling out an earbud, he glances at me.

‘You forgot to turn left! Back there! I’m late!’

He turns a grizzly eye towards me.

‘Not on your nelly, love. Word’s out that them witches are havin’ their yearly coven up yonder.’

‘And?’

‘And I don’t want my eyebrows singed again. You’ll have to wait until next stop.’

I harrumph noisily as the bus rumbles along; smooth out the brim of my hat, stop the kitty from eating my newt’s eyes and curse once more that I’d forgotten my broomstick.

.

 

[Litopian]

From The Soul Conductor
---

The Route of the Damned


The night bus can’t turn left. It only runs in a circle, a circle through the yesterdays of your life. Ghosts of those you wronged press their tattered faces against the windows. Each street you turn down is a memory of the pain that you caused. There are no spirits of redemption here, no roads that lead to the saints of tomorrow.

You haul on the wheel with all of your might, but the course is set, always right.

Because you were always right. You always made the right choice. The choice that was right for you.

And damn the rest.

You would weep if not for the fear that clamps you stiff.

You were always right. And damn the rest.

And now you can watch them be damned, forever.

The night bus can’t turn left.

 

[Litopian]

From The Nightmare King
---

“Driver! Shoulda turned left there!”

He grunts and the bus heads straight.

I slump into the seat. My Spiderman costume has a rip across the front from where Angie had sliced it with the scissors.

My chest itches.

Angie was fucking mental when she saw us, but Hannah looked so fit as Catwoman; had to have a quicky.

The bus bounces over a bump. A spasm flares in my chest.

“Oi, Driver!”

No answer.

Where the fuck’s he going?

I look out the windows. The houses are dark and dilapidated.

I head to the front of the bus.

“Driver! The number 8 goes through the Hatton estate, not this shitho---”

I stop. The driver’s face is white. A thick flap of flesh hangs off his cheek.

“What the fuck?”

He points at the lettering on the windscreen. It reads ‘Charon’s Ferries’.

I don’t remember getting on this bus.

Something wet seeps across my chest.

I don’t remember leaving the party.

There was a flash of metal before my eyes and a scream, “You bastard!”

I plunge my fingers into the rip of my costume and pull out loops of metal.

The scissors are caked in blood.

The driver grins.

 

[Litopian]

From Choco Pudding
---

The night bus can’t turn left. It might have to with the fact the bus driver is dead. Dead like the young woman with tonight’s shopping spilled out on the ground next to him. Another woman, maybe forty jumps up from her seat, letting out a scream as she tries to escape. Was it an apple or orange? I don’t know. Maybe it’s the knife flying toward her back. But she falls all the same, her head cracking into the skull of an old man wheezing trying to stand. He falls back head clanging against the oxygen tank, at least his family will get their deposit back.

That’s four down and only three to go. We blast through a red light, the bridge ahead drawing closer. Two teen’s one boy and one girl stand in unison. Their eyes are determined as long strides make way to the back exit. I admire their bravery, but not their eyesight. Barbed wire drawn tight across the aisle embraces them and shows me what they had for lunch.

Bridge is just ahead and I stand. Stepping over the barbed wire, ignoring the pleas for help of the two holding their insides in their hands.
A boy my age, nineteen, is crouched down behind a seat.
“It…can-can’t turn left,” he spits out. I smile and take then pen out of his pocket. “It can’t…” his words are caught in his throat or maybe they escaped from the hole I made.?
I continue toward the front, the driver as dead as the rest. Reaching over I take his cap and find it fits perfectly. The bridge is so damn close. Too close. My hands are quick and I pull him off, taking his seat my hands on the wheel.
Brakes.
The sound of the diesel engine vibrates urging my ecstasy that needs to escape.
Two taps on the window and I turn and smile. The guy is young, twenty five which is older than me.
“Sorry miss, you must be new, but the night bus can’t turn left,” he says motioning to the closed exit. “You have to take the right.”
“Why?” I ask. His answers is important, his life depends on it, though he doesn’t know it.
“They are doing work on that lane,” he says. “Have been for the last three weeks.”
“Thank you,” I said putting the bus in gear. “My trainer never told me that.” My eyes go to the old man on the ground. “I guess you were right after all.”
The toll attendant smiles, tips his hat and I pull forward. The night bus can’t turn left and now I know why.

 

[Litopian]

From Halloween's coming for you
---

The bus can’t turn left.

When we boarded, the driver’s Freddie costume gave me the shivers. Those nails. They gleamed around the steering wheel, awkward, like Edward Scissorhand.

Now, the driver laughs, as though he enjoys this.

What’s funny?

The bus is careening, hugging the mountainside. Uncontrollably. Buses speeding isn’t funny. Nor is crashing into a valley of trees. Or dancing with death. My heart hammers. I squeeze Jenny’s hand, daring a glance. She’s white as a vampire. And that’s not her costume.

“Why didn’t we stay home?”

“First Halloween party.” Her voice cracks.

“Last one, too.”

A night of laughter. A night of flirting.

Such a contrast to now.

The bus is quiet. We’re alone.

Suddenly, the bus swerves right. We’re going up, not down. The bus slows.

It’s a brake-ramp.

“Yay!” I jump, punching the air. We live! He saved us. I’m pleasantly impressed.

The bus rolls to a stop. The driver pulls on the brakes. They hiss. He gets up and walks toward us. His nails drag, whining over each metallic backrest.

“Girls.” He smiles a wicked smile.

My stomach sinks; my blood splatter dress feels appropriate.

He saves us - for him.

 

[Litopian]

From Drive-me-nuts
---

“The night bus can't turn left” mumbles the man in the straight jacket. He's rocking back and forth in his chair with expanding slimes of drool dangling from the corners of his mouth, his vacant expression suggests demonic possession as he continues over and over... “The night bus can't turn left.”

“What the fuck is wrong with this guy?”, asks the Sergeant, bursting into the police holding cell to join his colleague.

“His wife just dropped him off, Sarge. He’s scaring the children. She said she doesn't want him back if he stays like this. She didn't know where else to bring him.”

“Is he on drugs?” asks the Sergeant, scanning the man’s eyes.

“No.” Replies the Constable, flicking through the man's medical report.

“Dementia?

“No.”

“Alzheimer's?”

“No.”

“Well what the hell has sent him bat-shit crazy then?”

“We're not too sure yet, Sarge. We're waiting for the psychiatrist. His wife said he went off to enter a Halloween Flash Club competition with a one sentence prompt two days ago. Apparently, he's been like this ever since.”

 

[Litopian]

From Hell-Kitty
---

The night bus can't turn left.

He's trying to take us down there. The driver.

He. It. The thing at the wheel.

He looked OK to start with, his handsome smiling face.

There was a cheerful pip of the horn and I said a last goodbye to my body, and went floating out of the open window and down to where the bus sat waiting, open doors. My people had said their last goodbyes until the funeral, and left me in the care of the funeral director.

She seemed nice, handling my empty body. Kind. But I didn't want to stay for the next bit. Didn't want to watch.

I was hovering, undecided as to what I did next, when I heard the pip of the horn, and I went to see. Maybe this was what they meant by the famous Last Trump?

"Time to come with me", the driver said pleasantly, and I took him for an angel. Why wouldn't I? He looked like one at first.

Other faces, other newly released souls smiled out through the windows, and on I hopped.

"Atta girl!" sang the driver. "And that makes ten nil to me!"

The bus started going faster and faster and he started singing, "The wheels on the bus go round and round!"

The bus got faster. The singing got louder.

What did he mean, ten-nil to him? How many on the bus? I turned and counted. One, two, three, four...

There were ten of us on board. None of the others were smiling. And none of them had faces any more. Only skulls.

I felt my face, and met hard bone. My hands....claws of empty bone.

I stood and moved forward, my hands either side of the seats, so as not to be flung across the aisle as the bus sped...to wherever it was going.

"Let me off! Now!"

"Relaxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx," the driver said, but his voice was different. Slower, deeper, almost too deep to make out the words.

The bus slowed, moving into the next lane, indicators on, getting ready to turn left, the driver laughing to himself about some joke he wasn't sharing with us.

And then he stamped on the brakes, and threw up his hands, blinded by a sudden massive blast of light, and I was flung to the floor.

"Shit!" the driver said, covering his eyes. "Shitshitfuckingshit"

The doors flew open.

"Talking about yourself again, are we, Lucy?" said a voice, pleasantly, coming from somewhere inside of the light.

Light, shifting, taking form. A face and two vast wings of blue-white light.

"Up to the old bus trick again, I see," the voice said, "And where do you think you are taking this lot, Lucy? Let me guess."

"Don't you call me that," the driver growled like ten tigers on steroids. "don't you dare, Michael, you fucking arse-licker."

He tried to close the doors but the button didn't work.

"We'll call you whatever we like, Lucy Liar, you sulphurous sneaking bastard piece of shit", said a second, harder voice as another light appeared alongside the first one, this one dazzling red and yellow light, "and now, let's be having you back where you belong. Allow me do the honours, Michael."

"Be my guest, old bean."

A sword of yellow light reached in and skewered the driver, like spitting a bug on a pin, and dragged him out, still impaled but seeming very much alive, and furious, screeching in rage as he was dragged down that left hand road and behind them, all the lights went out as the screeching and yelling got fainter.

I started crying. So did everyone else and when I turned and looked, they had their proper faces back again

"Rest easy, folks," Michael said, sitting himself in the driver's seat, "My good old friend Uriel is dealing with that one, and now let's get you home."

"I don't understand," I said, between sobs of relief, tears rolling down my cheeks. My hands were hands again, clothed in flesh, or at least, the comforting,familiar illusion of flesh. My face felt like my face again.
"What just happened?"

"You are all safe now," the new driver said, "We're on the case. For, "Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for thou art with me; thy rod and thy staff they comfort me. He never lets up, but nor do we. "

He sniffed, "and everywhere he goes he leaves his stink. Phewee. It doesn't half stink in here."

And from somewhere he produced, and offered me a stick of chewing gum.

 

[Litopian]

From Rick Cheeseman
---

The night bus can’t turn left.
‘Haven’t you heard? Somebody jumped of the bridge, or was pushed. Either way, it’ll be shut for hours,’ the driver says.
I sigh. ‘How am I supposed to get home?’
‘I can get you home but it’s going to be a long ride. We’ll have to go around by Dogsthorpe.’
‘Dogsthorpe!’
‘Unless you have a better idea?’

I find a seat towards the back of the bus. It’s busy tonight, Halloween. Half the people here look like zombies…No change there.
As the epic-opus to Dogsthorpe continues the numbers dwindle until, finally, there is only myself and one other person left on the bus. She’s fucked; sunken eyes stare out from behind a greasy, black fringe.
The bus pulls over and the driver calls. ‘Last stop.’
I get out of my seat and turn to see the girl still seated. ‘Last stop, love, you need to get off here.’
Nothing.
‘Last Stop!’ The driver says.
‘I heard,’ I say and make my way to the front. ‘You might have trouble with her,’
The driver turns around in his seat. ‘Who?’ He says…