Roger Bultot’s photo 
Rochelle’s Friday Fictioneers challenge this week is inspired by an old building, steeped in history, no doubt. Can you write a 100 word story ?
THEO
Theo gathered the rough cassock tightly around his thin body against the stone chill of the monastery corridor. He walked lost in thought, convinced that he had de-crypted the code, thanks to his Master Nostradamus. Theo would be the 17th century monk who discovered the secret of accurate prediction.
Messages without quill or parchment, travel without horses, images beamed across continents, automata to work the fields…
“Theo , it’s suppertime please come to the refectory”.
Theo closed his laptop, slowly, still lost in the plot of the short story he was writing. What would his monk do next, I wonder ? Would his fellow monks laugh at him for making these zany predictions ?
Theo’s tutor on the short story writing course had instructed his students to bring a draft to their evening seminar. His monk could always leave his monastery and go into the prophesy business..
April 14, 2019 at 4:47 am
Blurring reality and fiction – that’s tricky. Theo sounds like he’s onto a good idea, anyway. I like how you’ve done this – your experiment worked.
April 14, 2019 at 1:34 pm
Thanks for your feedback Margaret
April 14, 2019 at 3:10 am
Using a laptop means, Theo is practicing what Nostradamus predicted. Why is he reluctant to share his idea with his brothers?
April 14, 2019 at 1:39 pm
Thanks for your comment. Perhaps when a new invention comes along, people’s first reaction is hostile, dis-believing ?
April 13, 2019 at 10:31 pm
Nice job switching the reader from one century to the next.
April 14, 2019 at 1:46 pm
Thanks for your comment Alicia.
April 13, 2019 at 9:54 pm
I truly believe some people “see” more than others and their predictions are warnings we should at least listen to. Loved the “writing Monk.”
April 16, 2019 at 8:26 am
Thanks so much for your comment – glad you enjoyed the story.
April 13, 2019 at 3:10 pm
Heh, Theo is a bit of a Mary Sue, writing himself into something he wishes he did. Great take and mixing of fiction and reality in this flash fic whish isn’t really reality but fiction though in a way real, but… 🙂
April 14, 2019 at 1:51 pm
I appreciate your comment – so glad you like it. I’m not familiar with Mary Sue – do tell me.
April 15, 2019 at 4:16 pm
It’s authorial self-insertion, often with idealized abilities, see here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mary_Sue — Theo’s case is very mild though. 🙂
April 12, 2019 at 3:24 pm
I absolutely love this, Francine. I should think this would be the perfect place to write!
April 12, 2019 at 4:41 pm
Thanks so much Dale. I agree, a bit of a retreat is good for writing, as long as someone else is doing the cooking…
April 12, 2019 at 3:02 pm
Sometimes I think the only way I’m going to get my book written is to go on a very long cloistered retreat 🙂
You surprised me with the monk being a fictional character. Very well done.
April 12, 2019 at 4:47 pm
Thanks so much, I’m glad you liked the story. It was an experiment to switch Theo’s.
April 12, 2019 at 12:19 pm
Dear Francine,
You’ve captured the mind of the writer. I love the way you took us into the distant past and brought us back to the present with the close of a laptop. Well done.
Shalom,
Rochelle
April 12, 2019 at 12:36 pm
Thank you- so pleased the story line worked for you. It was a bit of an experiment !
April 11, 2019 at 11:35 am
I think the monastic lifestyle would lend itself favorably to writing. And what better subject matter than rewriting history since outside influence is minimal. Excellent well thought pout write WWM.
April 12, 2019 at 12:47 pm
Thank you Violet, I appreciate your comment. I’m sure a quiet environment is good for writing.
April 11, 2019 at 11:27 am
Theo the monk will definitely be laughed at by the other monks. But very politely as they are monks after all 🙂
April 12, 2019 at 12:54 pm
Great comment Ali – I love the idea of the other monks laughing politely, I can just see it.
April 10, 2019 at 11:46 pm
I guess the trick of not being laughed at for making zany predictions is that they should come true. And the trick of making predictions that come true, as seers throughout the ages have known, is to make them ambiguous
April 12, 2019 at 4:53 pm
How interesting Neil – I’ve never thought that through before, & it rings true.
At the frivolous end of fortune telling, in primary school we used to make square paper fortune tellers, & write our own predictions – ‘something special will happen on Tuesday !’ Our own wishes at the time I guess.
April 10, 2019 at 9:54 pm
Great stuff, this is actually how it happened, maybe…
April 12, 2019 at 4:57 pm
Thanks for your comment . Glad you liked the story.
April 10, 2019 at 9:37 pm
A monk who writes fiction, or will it turn out to be fact!?
April 12, 2019 at 5:03 pm
Thanks Iain. I started wondering about how the two Theo’s might influence each other, or whether the monk one discovers a mobile phone in his cell ?