Exceptional Ready... Aim... Listen The Killing Wall by Jay Squires 75 Words Flash Fiction contest entry

Warning: The author has noted that this contains the highest level of violence. Wrists bound behind me, I trace pocks in the wall.   Before our masking, we faced our executioners. Ten smooth-faced youths. One for each prisoner. None knows which rifle holds the blank.   Didn't Socrates say: “If you hear the shot, yours was the blank.”?   A foreign command. Ten bolts slide across oiled chambers. The “Ready”?   A sudden stench of urine overwhelms.   Another untranslated bark… The “Aim”?   I fish-gulp oxygen. Warmth suffuses my crotch.   I listen intensely.   Recognized Author Notes Thanks to Sebastian Leon Prado on Unsplash for the photo.

© Copyright 2024. Jay Squires All rights reserved. Jay Squires has granted FanStory.com, its affiliates and its syndicates non-exclusive rights to display this work.