Good stuff. Lots of charm and an entertaining little tail. Here are some lines that I enjoyed in particular, "But instead of a shin-level savaging", "what good is a wizard who can't prattle under pressure?", "If ever an emergency called for quick access to a firepoker or a baseball bat or an antique battle-trident", overall I really enjoyed the humor and the flow of the story. The only technical issue that I noticed was that you used 'intent' as an adverb. Can't think of anything to really be critical over. I like this Michael Reeve character, keep it up!
Cool, creepy story. Good dialogue, the oddness of the situation played to the cryptic narrative.
"He smiled at me and I began to consider bringing him with me home. At least, he could spend the night on a warm couch instead." comes before "I...worried that he might be homeless", but I think that logically it should be the other way around.
Don't really have much else to say, it's a pretty tight story. These are just some questions that I as a reader have that may or may not be right for the story: How was Tom murdered? It might have more of an impact and be more visual if instead of Tom saying, "I was murdered here", he said "I was strangled here" or something like that.
Interesting, enjoyable story. My favorite lines were: "He wondered how long it had been since maintenance had maintained.", and "his unnaturally busy job as his town's gravedigger."
Here are my suggestions:
You switch between past tense and present tense a lot. This inconsistency can interrupt the flow of the story. I'd just make everything present tense.
"He yanks open the cabinet. A pair of dusty rolls toilet paper sat. He grabs one." These three simple sentences feel really choppy. You could combine the first two by inserting a 'where' between "cabinet" and "A".
The next paragraph is a humorous transition to Samson remembering his wife. I would drop the "Curiously", so the reference to the wife is more swift and sudden
"His final thought of Nina, knowing her as a living being, was she never replaced the toilet paper." This sounds odd, although still grammatically correct (I think). I'd insert a 'that' between "was" and "she".
Intriguing concept, here's a couple of things that stuck out to me that you can feel free to take into consideration:
You use the word "seemingly" a lot in the first paragraph. I know that you want to make a point of the protagonist's unsureness, but the story would have more of a kick to it if you dropped them. Which has more impact, and acts as a stronger hook, "It seemed like I’d been stuck in that frigid, lonely maze forever, a puzzle with no solution", or "I'd been stuck in that frigid, lonely maze forever." As a reader, I think the second one does.
"I followed the specter along the twisting corridors until we finally arrived at a bridge I'd truly never seen before." 'truly' is unnecessary. Word economy is especially pertinent to making flash fiction.
Just my two cents. I'd like to see this fleshed out further and turned into a longer short story. Keep up the good work!
Your storytelling as a whole is very well-done. Even in this brief entry, I feel ensconced in this fantasy world that you have constructed. The story flows nicely and you give just enough detail to where I have a picture of the world, but not too much detail to where I'm overwhelmed.
The main thing that I think that you can improve upon, and which would prompt me to give this another star, would be the dialogue. It's very cliche. I know that these are archetypal characters here, the virtuous master and his arrogant, corrupted apprentice, but your ability to add nuance to your characters is what is going to set your stories apart from other fantasy stories. Try to think of creative ways to reveal the relationship between the two of them that both reveals their archetypal nature and their unique personalities. Archetypes, by definition, are very general characterizations that repeat in stories. I understand that it's hard to do in such a short amount of story space, but if you could give the reader a look at the personalities of your characters in non-cliche fashion, I think you could take this already well-told story to the next level.
"He turned around into a fire-lit stone room of the tower" sounded odd to me; I don't know if it's a grammatical error or just an odd sounding phrase. Could sound better as "into the fire-lit stone room of the tower" or "into a fire-lit stone room in the tower."
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