No Fuzzy Bunnies Here

Recently, as in just yesterday, I became a new contributing author for Vamplit Publishing's ongoing Friday Flash event. Every month they post a theme, and each week they have a topic within that theme, and by Friday the authors who are going to contribute must have a Flash (1,000 words or less) Horror story prepared to post. I've seen it on Twitter, and it seems like a viable way to get my name and work out there in the public eye. I took a look at the topic they had posted for this week (circus acts) and a fairly gruesome story just popped into my head. I chuckled about it and got to work.
Sometime during the middle of the week I sort of wondered at the ease with which I came up with that story idea. I mean, it was within seconds of seeing the topic, and it just popped in there. Terrific, but maybe a little disturbing. As I thought about that, it occurred to me to take a look at everything I was writing at that time.
I had four writing projects all working in rotation, all at the same time.

1. A horror Flash story set in a circus for Vamplit's Friday Flash.
2. I'm still working on my NaNo novel, Home Grown, which is a ghost story. An occasionally graphic ghost story.
3. I'm in the middle of writing a story for an anthology I was invited to work on. The title of the anthology is "Zombies Need Love Too". I'll just let you guess what that one is focused on.
4. This blog.

This blog seems to be the only thing I was working on that wasn't horror at all.

That's not right, I thought. I must be able to write something other than Horror, right?


So I sat down and tried to think of the opposite of Horror. Fuzzy bunnies, right? Fuzzy bunnies are just about as not Horror as you can get, right? So I wondered what kind of a story I could make out of a fuzzy bunny...

A fuzzy bunny sitting in the target sight of a flamethrower...

No! No, no... not that. Start again.

A cute little fuzzy bunny, and he's at work, ...and he's a slave at a Rabbit's Foot factory, forced to wield the chopper...


No! No no no... oh my God! Try again...

A cute fuzzy bunny, just hopping along, ... wielding the flame-thrower and exacting vengeance against the owners of a Rabbit's Foot factory... a bunny with only one leg...


Oh for the love of God! Okay... I'll try it one more time. I closed my eyes...

"Mommy, mommy, I want the bunny," said the little girl.
"Which bunny, Annie?"
"That one!" Annie points to a gray flop-eared rabbit sitting all alone in a rabbit cage. Its nose twinkles and wiggles as it gnaws on a carrot stub, so focused on that task it's oblivious to the watching little girl.
"That's Bugsy," says the man behind the counter. "We've had him for a long time, and he does need a good home. Would you like to pick him up? I'm sure he wouldn't mind."
"Awesome!" Little Annie is all smiles as her mother lifts the lid off the cage, allowing Annie to reach in and tuck her hands around the chewing rabbit. The girl lifts Bugsy out, cradling him against her chest.
"Oh, Mom, he's so soft!"
And Bugsy, having lulled them into a false sense of security, chooses this moment to attack. Annie's mother screams in shock and looks to the man behind the counter for help, but he's drawing the shade as he locks the door. He tucks a sign into the window behind the shade - Feeding time, back in 15 min.


Okay... I think I have a problem.

Talk to you later!