The winner - Food Fight by Roy

Replacing the half-eaten roasted femur in the ice-box, Missmatthews sighed. “There’s nothing so tasty as a bit of thigh meat before bed," she said to herself. Mrmatthews was asleep and she didn’t want to wake him. He’s such a bear when he is disturbed. She went about the cook alcove, tidying up after the repas and then requested a small Turbulan green salad for balance. Missmatthews was pregnant, six days now, and craved greens, usually detestable in a Crocpup's diet. Mrhubblar came in and surprised Missmatthews. “What are you doing up? It’s not your time.”
“I don't know. The sleep chamber cycled me awake and I’m hungry.”
“I ate the femur and part of the torso already, so you’ll have to defrost some other roast or maybe a kidney or liver.”
Mrhubblar frowned and shuddered. His long crocnose crinkled up and his eyes teared. “Y’know how much I hate organ meat, Ma. I hate it. I won’t eat liver!”
“Dear, how do you expect to grow up strong and mutant like your father? You got to eat organs to assimilate them into your connective tissue.”
“I wish we never invaded Earth. They are tasteless creatures, same old, all the time. Too fatty for me, y’know, ma. Too bland. Yeccch!”
“Well, you know how the Federation dictates the harvest. They insist on bleeding the herd and collecting the blood for the district nurseries. You can’t have your meat and eat blood, too. You were weaned six months ago, so get used to eating organs and whatever else is on the bone.”
“Ma, not fair. I saw Mrmatthews sipping a red bloodwine last night. When am I old enough to imbibe, hah?”
“Impudent!”
“Sorry, but grown ups are unfair to us kids.” Mrhubblar trounced out of the mainroom and slammed the door to his sleepcubicle. Missmatthews heard the hiss of the sleep chamber and sighed. “He went to sleep without his dinner. Kids, they never want to eat right.”
***
The death ray penetrated the hull just slighly under the slipstream generator, whisper soft, but Missmatthews heard it. Her second set of eyes glowed red with anger. “Marauders! Must wake Mrmatthews immediately!” She sat at the hypnoconsole and turned it on max. The rings and spirals assailed her two sets of eyes and put her into the coma. Another ray pierced the luggage area and opened the cargo bay to deep space. An immediate response from the Aeroship sealed the zone and restored nitrogen balance to a livable sixty two percent, adding a pressure stream of nitrous oxide and sulfur monoxide in five percent saturations. The Aeroship was designed to react instantaneously to five such hits, but the mirror shielding would not reflect more blows unless Mrmatthews awoke and reset the count. He had the code to cloak the ship from further harm, but they’d all be in stealth mode until the invaders gave up and left the region.
The hypocycle ended and Mrmatthews emerged as dominant. His roar was heard several parsecs away. Overwhelming hunger and resentment at the attack mixed as his sleepgrog left him for more immediate issues. Mrmatthews hated anything that disturbed his sleep cycle, most of all, races who ate Crocpups. As a prince Croc his anger was, of course, justified. His first duty was to his family and then to the nation on the prowl. Food was plentiful from Earth, so marauder intrusion was disturbing to the century long feast. Most races were inedible, and marauders usually weren’t fussy at what they ate. He knew that they were after the frozen city cargo Matthews carried.
Mrmatthews slammed his forepaw into the weapons console, unable to focus on strategy. The six weapons responded to the controls and dispersed two laser cannons, three death rays and a feeble phaeton burst. The burst lit up the sector but did little else. But dumb luck ruled and one death ray hit the propulsion tank on the attacking ship and blew it to Orion in molecular size pieces. The cannons missed their mark, continued on the trajectory and, unfortunately, decimated two moons of Jupiter. “Crapona!” But Mrmatthews knew not what havoc his anger caused. It was a costly mistake.
The radio buzzed and visscreen lit up. “Matthews!” The voice was the prime minister.
“Yes, sir.”
A raspy harumpf filled the forward cabin. “Explanation?”
“Sir, I - I was at war with the marauder ship and accidently shot two Jupiter moons.”
“Blast you, Matthews!”
“But, sir, the marauder ship-”
“And what are we going to eat now?”
“Sir?”
“You blundercroc! Those moons were our storage sites for the entire planet. All the humans and all the blood is vaporized!”
“Gone? Sir, I didn’t know.”
“Come in, Matthews. Right now. We’re bringing charges of treason against you.”
“Yes, sir.”
Mrmatthews shut down the communications console and sat. His four eyes teared and thin red tongue darted out with increasing alarm. “What will we do? No food and they’re blaming me? I didn’t put the humans, all of them, on two moons. I didn’t impose secrecy so no one knew. I didn’t intentionally do anything wrong, but I’m at fault. It’s not fair!” His forepaw slammed into the sleepconsole and released Mrhubblar from his plastic cocoon. Actually, his paw went through the console and insured that the sleepcubicle would never work in the kid’s lifetime. “Well, I’m on a roll. All I ever do is destroy stuff.” His only chance was to wake Missmatthews. She’d know exactly what to do in this predicament.
***
The hypnocycle ended and Missmathews emerged dominant, shrouded in sleep and unwilling toward alertness. Within a timesec she became fully aware of the situation. Mrmatthews was still awake and babbling faster than she could assimilate his thoughts. Food destroyed … moons … sleepcubicle … anger … don’t wake me up, ever… She thought, “Just like him to leave his mess for me to clean up.” Missmatthews stood and felt the weakness of the interrupted sleepcycle. Holding onto the console she heard Mrhubblar stirring, a low grunt, swear words he’d never say in front of her. “Mrhubblar, get out here! WE have work to do!”
She traversed the cabin in record time, all eight steps in a timesec, accessed the power schedule and saw she had enough crystal power to go to slipstream. Where to go? Mrhubblar came out and shook off grog, allowing tears to drip from his eyes. His pointed teeth flared outward, a sure sign of overhunger. “Ma, I need an organ or else I’ll drop. But no liver.”
“Help yourself, kid. I’m trying to figure out an escape route.”
“Escape? Who are you escaping from? Marauders?”
“No, your dad managed to blow the food moons to smithereens, so we’re up for the traitor award of the century. Dad’s got a million jeebees bounty on his head, and I’m damned if I’m spending my life in prisonhell with him on my mind.”
“So you can say “damn” and I can’t? How fair is that?”
“Eat your organ meat and shut up.”
Missmathews charted the Aeroship into the Sparseland sector, a place uncharted by Crocpups. The area was given up to hide marauders and not policed by the Federation. But our food supply would be a grand prize to just about everyone there. In fact our food locker'd be up for grabs by all the Crocpups because there weren’t any more bodies to eat. I'm alone out here, alone!" The relay processor found a distant sector with a wormhole, but it'd be dangerous to go there. “Just the place to flee to. Just short of the wormhole, that’s the plan.”
“Ma, where’re we goin’?” The Aeroship was just about there.
“Shut up and eat your organs!” Missmatthews by now sounded more like Mrmatthews, but it couldn’t be helped. She flipped the switches on the console with one talon and heard the slipstream generator ramp down. At the same time a death ray came from their aft, colliding with the initiation of slipgeneration. A blue flash filled the cabin and shook every molecule in their bodies, like a severe electric shock. The sensation subsided as the ship powered down slowly and then stopped. The slipstream generator was not functional. They went through the wormhole and went nowhere, one big dumb loop. Missmatthews sighed, saw the vision in her eyes of chains on her back legs, dragging a heavy beam around an eight by ten cell forever. “Crocpups live, oh, ten centuries? Maybe I’ll learn to screen out his voice by then. Or else go insane and won’t care.”
“Matthews? Are you okay there?” The crackling voice of the prime minister filled her ears. She began to cry and tremble. The visscreen went on, even though it was not working before. “Missmatthews, dear? What happened?”
“Uh, sir, I really don’t know. I’m not good at this sort of thing.” Missmathews decided to plead incompetence, maybe get off with just an hour rant and maybe a mind meld separation.
“We saw a disturbance in your sector and thought we’d check in?”
“Yeah, disturbance.”
Mrhubble piped in. “Yeah, sir, marauders all over here. Pa is asleep.”
“Marauders, you say? Well, we’ll have to send a patrol out there to protect you. Right away. Hey, this is not known, but stay away from Jupiter’s moons. Official government projects underway. Don’t want any friendly fire to hit the moons.”
“We already hit-” A forepaw slapped Mrhubble in the snout with lightning speed.
“Sir, he’s just a kid. Excited, but we already hit a marauder ship and it fled into space. I think we’re safe for the moment, kind of shaken, but okay.”
“Well, you hold on. Tell Mrmatthews we commend his trust in you both to hold the ship while he gets his needed sleepcycle. Out.”
Mrhubble looked confused. Missmatthews opened the cooler and found the femur she had eaten just parcycles ago. “Cause to celebrate, kid. We get to live another day.”
“So, do I still have to eat the liver?”
“We’ll wait until your father is back.” She teared all her eyes, but all were expressed joy. “There’s nothing so tasty as a bit of thigh meat before bed," Reliving the moment, she thought it strange, an overwhelming desire that all three be at the diningplace together, like she heard was done on Earth.

Miss Laurel Matthews of Ellsworth Manor by ?

The eldest in the family and the spinster who never left home, Miss Laurel Matthews had taken it upon herself to preserve the respected family name along with the cultural heritage of a bygone era. Since her parents were gone, Miss Laurel Matthews had become the matriarch of the family. Affectionately known as “Miss Laurel” around her small southern town, she taught high school English for some forty years before retiring to see to the care of her aging parents. Miss Laurel also taught etiquette classes for the local youth. Every parent in town who had any type of upbringing at all would enroll their offspring for at least one season of Miss Laurel’s training before sending them out into the world. Miss Laurel’s classes were always full and usually had quite a waiting list, until recent years. The general lack of gentility in the modern world had reduced the demand for Miss Laurel’s services, but those parents with the proper social finesse still knew the value of her instruction for the youth of the community.
On weekends, Miss Laurel conducted tours of her antebellum home, Ellsworth Manor. Ellsworth Manor was a grand home, indeed. A pre civil war structure, the home was on the registry of historical buildings and had quite a history if one was to believe all the stories. Miss Laurel was the epitome of the southern belle and offered tours of Ellsworth Manor, dressed, of course, in period costume. She lived in a fantasy world of cotillions, bridge clubs, women’s associations, and of course, her etiquette classes.
Miss Laurel was a much sought after figure in the local social scene. Throughout the years her picture graced many a society page in the area. However, Miss Laurel was unescorted at her many social appearances, save the few times one of her nephews would accompany her. Rumor had it that Miss Laurel had a suitor in her youth, but no one was sure what ever happened to him. Some say he was killed in the war, others say that Miss Laurel’s father had him escorted out of time due to the young suitor’s questionable lineage. Whatever happened, Miss Laurel never again found herself with male companionship.
Miss Laurel met John Riley at a charity social function. He was utterly charming and soon won the favor of the older lady. John Riley began to come visit Miss Laurel, starting with helping her with chores, painting, landscaping, doing repair work around the house. John’s visits became more frequent and longer in duration. Eventually, John was accompanying Miss Laurel around town and serving as her escort for social functions.
“She’s just an old fool,” her lady friends would whisper behind her back. “Certainly only after her money,” the men would agree.
John rekindled an old flame deep within Miss Laurel, a feeling that had been long buried. They would spend quiet evenings discussing art and literature and sipping brandy. They spent afternoons on the veranda, sipping ice tea, John happy to dress in period costume with Miss Laurel. He was quite a striking figure in his Confederate officer attire. John eventually moved into the guesthouse, just so he could be closer to Miss Laurel and look after her.
Jefferson and Nora were Miss Laurel’s trusted servants, maintaining a small house on the property. Nora served Miss Laurel as cook and housemaid while Jefferson was her gardener, driver and all around handyman. The couple had been with the family for some thirty years and were none too thrilled about the new house guest and certainly suspicious of his motives.
It was one Wednesday afternoon that Miss Laurel received a telephone call from Larry Freeman at the bank. Larry asked if he could come to Ellsworth Manor and speak with her. Since the Matthews family had long been one of his best and wealthiest customers, Larry was happy to make a personal call to her home.
“Miss Laurel”, Larry said, “I just received a phone call from Merchant’s Bank in Memphis. It seems that someone was trying to cash a rather large check from your account. The bank officer in Memphis was a little skeptical about the transaction, so she called us first.”
Miss Laurel tried to hide her surprise behind her usually cool demeanor and in a attempt to save face said, “It’s okay, Larry, I know about it. I sent John to Memphis to buy some supplies. We are going to expand the rose garden. Thank you for your concern., but it’s okay, really.” Nora escorted Larry to the front door.
Thinking herself to be quite the old fool, Miss Laurel decided to have a look around the guesthouse. Going through the closet and all of the bureau drawers, she found nothing out of the ordinary. As she headed toward the door, she noted a creak and a feeling of looseness in a floorboard. Retrieving a nail file from the bathroom, she pried up the loose floorboard. Underneath she found a Canadian passport for someone by the name of Mark Spencer, along with a sizeable sum of cash, and her grandmother’s diamond broach. Her initial shock now turning to anger, she pondered what she should do. She carefully replaced the items, except for the broach, and started out the door.
John drove up just as she was leaving the guesthouse. In a completely uncharacteristic manner, he confronted the old woman. “Miss Laurel, what are you doing?”
Trying to think quickly, but never having been practiced in the art of lying, she said, “I was just checking on the condition of your linens, I thought you might be in need of a few new things.”
John was less than amused. He laid his hands on her shoulders and shoved Miss Laurel backward into the guesthouse. She stumbled, falling backward onto the floor, losing her grip on the broach, it tumbled to the floor. “Now, you old biddy,” John said as he pinned her to the floor, “just exactly what were you doing in here?”
Miss Laurel made a feeble attempt to respond, but before she could formulate an answer, she could feel John’s hands grasping her throat. She felt light headed as if the life slowly draining from her body. Suddenly, Miss Laurel’s eyes widened and John Riley fell on top of her in a slump. She looked up to see Nora standing there, iron skillet in hand. Jefferson soon appeared in the doorway. Nora and Jefferson rolled John’s body off Miss Laurel. She was bruised but okay.
After a few moments of awkward silence, Jefferson said, “Not to worry, Ma’am, I’ll take care of this. It’s deer season, Joe down at the market always lets me use his butcher shop after hours during deer season.”
Late in the evening, the old black couple, faithful servants of the Matthews dynasty in this small southern town, struggled to load a large, oddly shaped package into the back of their old pickup truck.
The next morning, Miss Laurel opened her deep freeze to find an assortment of packages wrapped in butcher paper, marked “venison.”
John Riley, the charming stranger, disappeared from town as mysteriously as he had arrived. Most folks in town just figured he’d grown tired of hanging out with the old lady and moved on. Funny thing was, no one ever came looking for him.
Folks in town began to notice a change in Miss Laurel after John Riley left. Her students in her etiquette class noted that she was much testier than before and often repeated herself. The group dwindled down to just a few students whose parents wouldn’t let them quit. Miss Laurel still conducted tours of Ellsworth Manor, minus her usual charm and demeanor. After the tours, Miss Laurel would remain in her period costume well into the evening, sipping brandy and entertaining an imaginary guest.
Her extended family began to pay her more frequent visits, some out of concern for her well-being, and some to stake their claims on the family heirlooms.
She liked to think that a bit of John Riley was always with her. As was her habit, she enjoyed a light snack before retiring to her bedroom. Replacing the half-eaten roasted femur in the ice-box, Miss Matthews sighed. “There’s nothing so tasty as a bit of thigh meat before bed," she said to herself.

Untitled by ?

Miss Etta Matthews propped one arm on the top of her open refrigerator door and gazed longingly at the array of food arranged on the racks. She felt like a saint contemplating the face of God, but she also felt like a sinner contemplating temptation.
Just last month her doctor had scolded her about eating too much. Wagging a skinny finger in Etta’s face, Dr. Canterbury had carped, “Miss Matthews, if you keep this up, your arteries and the Big Dig will be in the same ball park, with too much arterial pressure in the pipes, and an over abundance of pork.”
Everyone in Boston is a joker these days, Miss Matthews thought.
She tried to follow Dr. Canterbury’s diet plan, but it was hard. Although she’d finished breakfast only twenty minutes ago, she was hungry again. You’d think eggs, bacon, sausage, toast, and cinnamon rolls would stick to her ribs, but they only stuck to her body.
She slammed the refrigerator door, causing a jar of a real mayo jar to clank against the Miracle Whip. This was one of Miss Matthew’s ongoing problems. Real mayo tasted a lot better on meat or cheese, but it was loaded with unhealthy fat. Still, Miracle Whips was really `Miracle Wimp’, in her opinion.
She wandered back into her living room, sat down on the blue velour sofa, and thought about her hatred of being fat.
Okay, she thought. It was time to accelerate The Magic Deed. It never failed. In a couple of weeks she could be as slim and sexy as any woman in town. Dr. Canterbury would gush over her appearance, and congratulate her and there would be no more Big Did jokes.
Miss Matthews remembered her happy discovery of The Magic Deed, which stemmed from a diet book her mother once brought back from the library, `What You Eat Is You’” As a chubby thirteen year old girl, Etta Matthews had thumbed through the book, and discovered its theme “The kind of food you ingest determines your entire appearance.”
It impressed Etta Matthews very much. For a fat and ugly adolescent kid who was constantly ridiculed and harassed by other, more attractive girls, it held the key to her later success.
The worst of her contemptuous classmates was a slender, popular girl named Tina Brittany LaMonde. Cheerleader and boy magnet and from a wealthy family, she was also brainy. Her jeers caused Miss Matthews much pain. Until she decided to do something about it
After all, if what you eat is you, why not give Tina Brittany a try?
It was easy. She followed the other girl after school one day, when she took a shortcut through the woods. A quick blow to the head, a bonfire, and then, a feast for Miss Matthews. She put the remains in a black plastic trash bag, along with twenty-five bricks, and threw it into the river.
The girl’s mother was involved in a bitter custody battle with Tina’s father, and just knew that the man had snatched his daughter.
And in a few weeks, a new, beautiful, slender Etta Matthews emerged.
On so it went. When she wanted to excel at tennis, there was that female pro who disappeared in the middle of the night. Never found.
Then there was the time Miss Matthews applied for a job that demanded knowledge of electrical wiring. An electrician went missing, and his wife just knew he’s run away with that bimbo from accounting.
On and on it went.
Of course, these things never lasted. All things pass through the digestive system, and Miss Matthews would slowly revert to her old self. And right now, Miss Matthews was fat, ugly, and out of work again.
Yes, it was time for faster action.
Last week, she’d snatched a lovely young woman whom she met through a block party. Jennifer Eaton jogged every evening at the same time.
Miss Matthews simply interrupted her jogging one night..
It was easy as pie. A meat pie.
Okay, Miss Matthews now thought, I’ll just finish off Eaton, even if I did finish breakfast only a few minutes ago. Time is wasting.
She went back to the fridge, took out a large white platter filled with meat, and plastered real mayo all over it.
Replacing the half-eaten roasted femur in the ice-box, Miss Matthews sighed. “There’s nothing so tasty as a bit of thigh meat before bed." She said to herself.
Then she retired, knowing full well that in just a couple of weeks, she would wake up gorgeous. Then she could apply for a much better job, too.
Ah, she thought as sleep crept into her body, it will be nice to be thin again, and have an income worth putting in the bank.
Life was good, even if she wasn’t.

August Flasher - Untitled by Steve

Three identically cut slices of meat; two tomatoes, ditto; a bunch of scallions; red lettuce; dill pickle; soft boiled egg; a liberal dollop of Heinz’ finest mayonnaise substitute. The perfect platter.

Replacing the half-eaten roasted femur in the ice-box, Miss Matthews sighed. If things carried on this way, soon she’d have to go on rations. She bit her lip.

“Don’t be so ungrateful, Gladys,” she said to herself, “enjoy the moment. The Lord will provide.”

Smiling again, she returned to the kitchen table and picked up her fork. She licked her lips.

“There’s nothing so tasty as a bit of thigh meat before bed."

The first forkful of tender pink meat had barely brushed her lips when she noticed the shaking. She stopped in mid flow and listened. Something heavy. A lorry maybe. Unable to control her curiosity, she returned the implement to her plate, and, grabbing her wooden walking stick with its mysterious dark patches, hobbled down the hall and into the living room.

The tiniest flick of the bay window lace curtains gave her all the information she needed. A removal truck. Parked outside the brownstone opposite. It looked like number 1139 was about to get new people.

Miss Matthews picked at the patches of hair on her stick as four large men let down the tailgate of the truck and began dragging out heavy brown furniture.

“About time,” she muttered, nodding to herself, “the just street didn’t look right with all that police tape flapping about the house. No. Not right at all.”

Now it looked like things would be getting back to normal. And just in time for Christmas too.

A station wagon pulled up behind the truck. A smiling woman got out followed by a tall, handsome man and one, two, three plump children.

Miss Matthews smiled and licked her lips again.

August Flasher posted by AJ

This brief was to include the following expression in some way into a story:

Replacing the half-eaten roasted femur in the ice-box, Miss Matthews sighed. “There’s nothing so tasty as a bit of thigh meat before bed," she said to herself.