This was my first ever NYC Midnight fiction entry. 250 words is a lot less than you think once you start writing, as a result of which I'm really impressed with the people who do well at the Microfiction 100 word variant. This one did pretty well - I came third in my group, and progressed to round 2, where I pretty much bombed with my "Indiana Jones-esque" tale of archeology, theft and murder. I'll add that if I can find it.
Local Knowledge, by Kevin Gill
Genre: Comedy. Action: Touching Wet Cement Word: Fresh “You see the thing about invading a foreign city…” said Captain Bob, leaning on his spear. “Is that you’re running quite literally into the unknown.” Private Mo nodded sagely and spat on the path beside his feet. Bob slapped him on the back of his head. “I’ve told you to stop that. How can we stop the street scumbags…” at this he looked affectionately down through the battlements at the throng of dirty people crowded in the street below, all trying to get through the gate into the inner keep at the same time. “But I digress. As I was saying, it’s the unknown. It takes a lot of planning. A lot of nouse. A lot of …” He fished in a pocket with his non-spear hand “…pork chunks. Well there’s a nice surprise.” He took a bite out of the grey hairy blob and stuffed it back into his pocket. “Not fresh but still tasty. But see these ones here.” He pointed with his spear at a crowd of armed men rushing through the destroyed front doors of the city. “They don’t know this place. They don’t know the layout. They don’t know the best routes. They don’t know…” he paused, raising his spear. “… that the whole of that road they’re running into is fresh wet cement, and they also don’t know …” he waved the spear and a hail of arrows cut down the men flailing in the sticky grey wetness of the road. “That they’re fucked.”
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